Rudyard Kipling (I865-1936)

‘You’re a better man than I am Gunga Din’.

I heard this phrase so often when I was growing up, it was years before I found out that it was part of a poem. Even then, the repetition of the phrase obscured the correct pronunciation and I was slow to realise the name was pronounced Deen not Din.

Perhaps like ‘Lead on MacDuff’, or ‘Him who asks no questions isn’t told no lies’ the phrase had come untethered from its context and was being used by people who didn’t know where it came from.

‘Though I’ve belted you and flayed you
By the living God that made you
You’re a better man than I am Gunga Din’

It’s hard to imagine words locked more securely into a poem’s rhythm.

And if you think Kipling’s Tommy is a racist, I think you’re missing the point of the story.

I've been rereading poems that were common knowledge when I was growing up. This is the last of that group.