Rudyard Kipling Stalky & Co
Edited by LIDIA VIANU
11 february 2015
Rudyard Kipling was born 140 years ago. We are now publishing his Stalky & Co, a book which is itself 116 years old, but which is younger today than it ever was.It is no coincidence that this book is being published on the birthday of Thomas Edison, inventor of the electric bulb: 11 February (1847).
Is this a book about 19th Century English boarding schools? About bullying? About clever pranks played on teachers who never failed to be taken in? About true friendship in adolescence? About those who pass on the light of knowledge — and so much more? It may be about all these things at once, but, before anything else, it is a book about BOYS.
Kipling describes three bosom friends. Read their ingenious adventures, worthy of a true strategist. If you want to find out, though, why this book is now more alive than ever, you will have to read between the lines, and identify those characters who manage to touch a student’s heart before addressing his mind.
What exactly can one learn at Westward-Ho, the boarding school in Devon described by Kipling in his book? Mathematics, Latin, Natural Sciences, English literature… Some of the people who teach those subjects should never have become teachers in the first place. We can easily understand why our three friends never trust their teachings at all. Only two of those teachers are bringers of light, possessing generosity, and a sense of humour. One of those two actually shows Kipling the way to becoming a writer.
Let us not forget that, in the year 1907, Rudyard Kipling was the first English writer to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature! „Rudyard Kipling’s Stalky & Co”, edited by Lidia Vianu is formally launched on 11 February 2015. The volume is available for consultation and downloading on receipt of this Press Release, at the following internet address: http://editura.mttlc.ro/kipling-stalky-and-co.html.
You are kindly invited to visit the Contemporary Literature Press website at http://editura.mttlc.ro/. For comments or suggestions, please contact the publisher lidia.vianu@g.unibuc.ro.
