http://localhost:8080/rough-men-stand-ready Senior Fellow, Hillsdale College Churchill Project, Writer and Historian Fri, 09 Jun 2023 19:44:13 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9 http://localhost:8080/rough-men-stand-ready#comment-66008 Fri, 09 Jun 2023 19:44:13 +0000 https://richardlangworth.com/?p=15611#comment-66008 Nice piece. Good to see June 6th honoured at a time when it sometimes seems to be fading into the background of history. I was struck by the remarks from Quote Investigator regarding the hypocrisy of humanitarians and Kipling’s understanding of it. It’s not just the contempt paid to the “Universal Soldier” in time of peace—“making mock of uniforms that guard you while you sleep.” The mirror image is presented when Kipling shows us one of the mocked acknowledging that humanitarians have their place. “You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din.” Some of Kipling’s early soldier work—both poetry and prose—can be hard going at first, as one adapts to the brogue, but the effort is repaid a hundredfold.

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