Kipling, Rudyard

72 pages (various sizes), v.p., 13 September 1899 - 11 April 1918, together with nine original envelopes; stains, horizontal fold lines, minor tears and offsetting. With: 12 transcriptions (several with multiple copies).

Together with: one autograph letter signed and one typed letter signed ("Rudyard Kipling") to Russell Doubleday; one typed copy of "Mulvanny Regrets"; With: Elsie Doubleday, 12 autograph letters signed ("Elsie") to Dorothy Doubleday; With: Caroline Kipling, 23 autograph letters signed (2 incomplete) ("C.K.", "Carrie Kipling", "C.K. R.K.", "Caroline Kipling") to Frank Nelson Doubleday, 2 autograph letters signed ("Carrie Kipling", "Aunt Carrie") and one typed letter signed ("Caroline Kipling") to Dorothy Doubleday (with one transcription); With: John Kipling, two autograph letters signed ("J.L. Kipling") to Frank Nelson Doubleday and one autograph letter signed ("John Kipling") to Dorothy Doubleday, with a post script by Caroline Kipling; With: Sara Anderson, one autograph note signed ("Sara Anderson") to Frank Nelson Doubleday.

Carrington, Charles. Rudyard Kipling: His Life and Work. London: Macillan & Co, 1955

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A trove of newly rediscovered correspondence from Rudyard Kipling to his American publisher and closest friend, Frank Nelson "Effendi" Doubleday, For nearly two decades the pair wrote of matters both professional and personal, including many of Kipling's major publications (including Kim), WWI, and the political climate. This archive also includes letters from Caroline, John, and Elsie Kipling to Frank Nelson Doubleday and his family.  

In 1895, Frank Nelson Doubleday walked into Rudyard Kipling's home with a business proposition: allow Scribners to publish a complete edition of the works of Rudyard Kipling. Doubleday and Kipling,  already a prolific author of novels, children's books, and short stories, became more than just professional collaborators as Doubleday endeared himself to both Rudyard and his wife Carrie. The two would be enjoy a lifelong, intimate friendship and upon founding his own firm in 1897, Doubleday would go on to publish all of Kipling's works until his death. Rudyard even gave Doubleday his famous moniker: "Effendi," Turkish for "lord" and an extrapolation of Doubleday's initials, "F.N.D." 

The present letters demonstrate how close the two were, and begins with a pep talk for Doubleday who appears to be at odds with a colleague: "Buck up- Keep your feet warm and your head cool - Keep your bowels open and remember we love you." Kipling goes on about upcoming publications, including "Just So Stories" and "Stalky," and signs off with news of an appointment with Andrew Carnegie: "Now I must go over to Skibo ... to say goodbye to Carnegie. It's a queer thing to consort with a man to whom money has absolutely no meaning. He is a great study and I am genuinely fond of him; even though he did catch seven trout to my one yesterday ... Dear love from us both to you and Effendem and the chicks."

As Kipling was finally finished up the serial publication of his famous work Kim, on which he had been working for seven year intermittently, he writes: "So take off your cute coat and gird up your panties and proceed to cram, ram and jam Kim down the throat of the Great Eagle. Make that pious but agitated bird understand that life without Kim is- inkimplete: that nobody with a hope of heaven can pass St. Peter without a copy of Kim in his shroud; that existence in the country or in the manufacturing centers in lightened and sweetened by Kim: that you can garden and read Kim, plant bulbs and now the grass with a better heart for reading him." 

In April 1910, he speaks of meeting with former President Roosevelt: "I had a note from Roosevelt the other day. He said he wanted to see me when he got to England so I've asked him down here. Think of Theodore in peaceful bateman's garden!"

The correspondence turns to the unavoidable topic of WWI, and on 2 November 1914, Kipling writes: "We've had about a fortnight's crazy-mad fighting on the seabord of France and the caualites are something to remember - Leaner than at the Arsne - But the Teuton he is losing men too and more, which is a comfort, on both frontiers. The Russian is getting in at him at last but Germany can put up five or six million of sorts, we haven't - more than one million Slow work! God knows what the Belgians have list in men, but they are scarcely men now after what was done to their land - just revenge machines." The war would claim the life of Kipling's son, John Kipling, in September 1915.

Letters from any of Doubleday's authors to the publisher are scarce; no others from Kipling to Doubleday have come up for auction.