English writer and poet, born in Bombay, India, 30 December 1865, but later educated in England, his home country. He had worked as a journalist from 1882 to 1889 in India, while he composed some poems and novels based on the local life and began to publish them in newspapers at the same time. His collection of short stories, Plain Tales from the Hills (1888), which describes the life of the English living in India and the local people, and his sole long story, Kim (1901), became popular among common people. His poems, which were influenced by hymn tunes and traditional ballads, also gained popularity, so he was a bestselling author, and was called the ‘informal Poet Laureate’. In 1907, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. His representative volume of poetry, Barrack-Room Ballads and Other Verses (1892), was admired as a work that describes accurately the English soldier’s bravery and loyalty and his great hardships on the battlefield.

Kipling’s literary ballad “The Last Ryme of True Thomas” was built on the motif and character of the traditional ballad “Thomas Rhymer”, which was based on the actual prophet and poet Thomas Erceldoune, who lived in the 13th century. Among the various characterizations of Thomas Rhymer written by various poets, Kipling’s Thomas, as a magnificent prophet, is know for remonstrating against man’s arrogance and denying worldly authority. (M. I.)

1. The Ballad of Boh Da Thone

2. The Ballad of East and West

3. The Ballad of Fisher’s Boarding House

4. The Ballad of Minepit Shaw

5. The Ballad of the “Bolivar”

6. The Ballad of the Cars

7. The Ballad of the “Clampherdown”

8. Cain and Abel

9. A Code of Morals

10. Danny Deever

11. Dinah in Heaven

12. Eddi’s Service

13. The English Way

14. The Fall of Jock Gillespie

15. The Gift of the Sea

16. The Grave of the Hundred Head

17. Lament of the Border Cattle Thief

18. The Last of the Light Brigade

19. The Last Rhyme of True Thomas

20. The Last Suttee

21. Loot

22. Municipal

23. Our Lady of the Sackcloth

24. The Peace of Dives

25. Pink Dominoes

26. The Rhyme of the Three Captains

27. The Rhyme of the Three Sealers

28. Rimmon

29. The Sea-Wife

30. Soldier, Soldier

31. The Truce of the Bear

32. The Widow’s Party