Without Benefit Of Clergy

[poliphilo]

The full title is Life's Handicap, being stories of Mine Own People.  Kipling was an Anglo-Indian, reared by a native ayah, who, in his own account, thought and dreamed in a "vernacular diction" before he learned English. When he says "Mine Own People" he means the people of India- all of them- not just those with pallid skins.

"Without Benefit of Clergy" tells the story of the relationship between two of these people- an English civil servant and the teenage Muslim girl he buys from her mother on a whim. It is a very simple story. What began as a prank quickly turns serious. The relationship has to be kept secret- at least from the man's white colleagues- and is conducted in a fever of anxiety- on her part because she knows he will eventually leave her for the "bold white mem-log", on his because he fears she will die- in childbirth or in one of the seasonal epidemics.  Nevertheless there are moments of feverish joy.  They name their happiness to be sure of it, then traduce it for fear of the gods. A child is born, stars are counted, a nursery rhyme is sung. But the end has been foreshadowed- and as Holden, the white man, rides away from the empty house he mutters to himself, "Oh you brute! You utter brute!"

It's a story about identity. The man's skin marks him out as a Sahib- and condemns him to the world of the club and the garden party- but his heart is in the little house with Ameera where- in hours snatched from the dull routine of his public life- he gets to speak and act as a Mussulman. Which is stronger, blood or desire? The house will be pulled down and a road built over it as the municipality wishes- "from the burning ghaut to the city wall"- but Holden: what will he do with the rest of his life? The question is left unanswered.

"Without Benefit of Clergy" and "On Greenhow Hill" are the two masterpieces of the collection. Elsewhere we have anger and opinions- here we have people merely living their lives- as we all do-  in a haze of imperfect understanding- hurting and being hurt.

Comments

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

The title, too, is striking and perhaps is not as meaningful to those of us not steeped in history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benefit_of_clergy

I take it (edit: the title) to be a bit of a play on words. On the one hand, the union of Holden and Ameera is not sanctioned by either the Church of England or any species of Islam that I'm aware of. On the other hand, there is nothing to lessen the blow on Holden -- no sustaining rituals of funeral and mourning, no possibility of talking of his grief -- imagine how *that* would have gone over at the club -- except, briefly, with his butler. These be curried eggs.

I think that many of Kipling's India tales are meditations on the Anglo-Indian's identity, which can fall anywhere on the continuum from stolid foursquare English on the one hand and the somewhat disapprobated "going native" on the other. We see this most intensely, of course, in Kim, where his European genetics is completely submerged in his native upbringing after his parents' death and the stamp of the bazaar is never erased -- fortunately for the secret service! Many of Kipling's most successful characters are navigating some kind of middle ground, with varying degrees of success.

I agree with your assessment of this as a masterpiece of the collection, as is On "Greenhow Hill." There may be a couple of others -- I forget.

By the way, I looked up the items in the table of contents you provided and found that a couple were missing from my index. This sent me to the basement to unpack my second-best Kipling, which turns out to contain a Life's Handicaps volume, so I can now read along with you without gyrations. This is a relief -- my best Kipling still has many volumes needing to have its pages cut, which is a tedious business. I mentioned this to Roy who commented, philosophically, that now the second best Kipling will hae to be unpacked in its entirety and a new bookcase may have to be fabricated.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

It's a clever title.

Kipling's whole life was a search for identity. His sometimes rather too strident patriotism was, I think, a product of not knowing quite who he was. People who are confident of their national identity don't need to go round with it blazoned on a T shirt. At one time, I believe, he seriously considered taking American citizenship.

If there are stories missing from your best Kipling does that mean that he himself suppressed them when he was making the final cut?

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

I don't think so. The set was published after his death. I left my list downstairs but will bring it up and let you know which ones they are.

(It's also possible that the index-maker made a mistake and that they're in one of the volumes.)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Kipling prepared a de luxe collected edition- known as The Sussex Edition- shortly before his death. I covet it hugely- but it's way outside my price range. It's possible that your Scribner's edition is based on this.

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

I suppose it could be. It includes _Something of Myself_ and an index.

The two missing stories are The Lang Men o' Larut and the Dream of Duncan Paranness.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Something of Myself is wonderful.

I can't remember a thing about those two missing stories. It's quite possible Kipling himself decided to drop them from the canon. I'll be more prepared to hazard an opinion on this when I've re-read them.

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

I skimmed them. If they had been mine, I probably would have dropped them.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

If your edition is based on the Sussex edition it ought to contain material that was collected nowhere else. The big test is whether it has "Proofs of Holy Writ"- the story about Shakespeare editing The King James Bible- which is the last thing Kipling published in his lifetime.

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

I think we had a conversation about that. I was really excited to find "Proofs of Holy Writ" in the index, only to find that it led to a reference to the work in "Something About Myself." I'm pretty sure I don't have one of the real editions de luxe but rather one of the middlebrow knock-offs.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes, you're right. I remember now. We've had this conversation before. :)