Lispeth

I denne study guide kan du få hjælp til at analysere novellen "Lispeth" af Rudyard Kipling, som kan findes i antologien Wider Contexts s. 265-270. Udover analysehjælpen kan du få et summary af teksten, samt idéer til fortolkning og perspektivering.

Præsentation af teksten

Titel: “Lispeth” (1886)
Forfatter: Rudyard Kipling
Genre: Short story

Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) var en britisk forfatter, som blev født i Indien. Hans værker inkluderer både romaner, noveller og digte. Kipling var generelt tilhænger af det britiske imperium, som han betragtede som en civiliserende indflydelse på de koloniserede lande. Mange af hans værker er inspireret af hans liv i Indien.

Uddrag

Nedenfor kan du se et kort uddrag fra vores study guide til novellen:

Title

The title of Rudyard Kipling's story, “Lispeth”, points to the protagonist of the plot – the local Indian girl who is christened and receives the British name Elizabeth. The fact that the girl is addressed by a pet-name “Lispeth” hints at the fact that Lispeth is treated with a sense of superiority both by the Chaplain and his wife and the Englishman she find on the road. For example, the Englishman never takes her love seriously: “He laughed a good deal, and said it was very pretty and romantic…” (p. 267, ll. 25-26). Similarly, the chaplain and his wife do not think Lispeth is good enough to marry an Englishman: “…it was ‘wrong and improper’ for Lispeth to think of marriage with an Englishman, who was of a superior clay…” (p. 268, ll. 24-26).

The fact that the girl is named Lispeth is also symbolic of imperialist attitudes at the time. Giving her a British name suggests that colonists believed that their culture was superior to the local one.