Since he wrote these stories during the several years he spent in Brattleboro, VT, we of the North Country have a particular affinity for Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Books.  The most familiar are the Mowgli tales, basis for the very good Disney movie.  Mowgli is an Indian infant who is lost in the jungle after Shere Khan (the tiger) kills his family.  Bagheera (the black panther) places him with a wolf family that has a newborn litter.  Mowgli's new "parents" and Bagheera and Baloo (the brown bear) sponsor him for membership in the Wolf Pack and, much to Shere Khan's chagrin, he is admitted.  Mowgli is raised according to Jungle Law, but all the while Shere Khan is plotting his revenge and ingratiating himself with the younger wolves.  Eventually, he leads a rebellion against Akela, the pack's aging leader and attacks Mowgli, who beats him away with a burning firebrand.  In these and the several other Mowgli stories--there are some prequels--Kipling strikes a nice balance between anthropomorphizing the animals and understanding Mowgli's natural superiority.

Also appearing in this collection is a story I've loved since I first saw the Classic Cartoon version--Rikki Tikki Tavi.  It tells the story of an intrepid young mongoose and his life or death battle to protect an Indian villa from a couple of particularly unpleasant cobras.  Rikki Tikki Tavi has always seemed to me to be one of the great heroes in all of literature.

These are great stories for young and old.  For folks who worry about Kipling's potentially imperialist, racist or racialist overtones (see review), rest assured, these tales are free of such themes.  They offer an excellent opportunity to introduce kids to the work of a true master storyteller.

(Reviewed:11-May-00)

Grade: (A) Orrin C. Judd

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