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It seems to me that this article should be split into two;
Gunga Din -- the default article, about the
Rudyard Kipling poem.
and
Gunga Din (film) -- an article about the RKO film.
-- HobbesPDX 20:24, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
I dont think that this movie was even worth watching What about yall.
I thought it was okay as long as you didn't expect it to stick closely to the poem
I Loved this movie back in the day. So neutrality of article is disputed because you do not like the movie? I don't get it. There. Removed Neutrality Disputed tag.
Wasn't there the Bold textGunga Diner from Watchmen
The poem contains non-English words which could use some explanation: bhisti, hitherao, Panee lao, juldee, dooli Bastie 15:33, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
Intro note currently notes an Iranian author using Gunga Din as a pen name, named Ali Mirdrekvandi. It's a red link and he gets 206 Google hits including Wikipedia mirrors of this article. I'll remove the intro note; feel free to re-add if the 206-hits guy is notable. Tempshill 00:31, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
"The name 'Gunga Din' is sarcastically used[citation needed] in the musical instrument world;" -- if this is original reporting, surely no citation is needed? I can vouch for the term being used, at least in the UK. It would also be used to criticize a performance, "I sounded like Gunga Din up there." -- Rfsmit 17:26, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
This article, as written, is not about the poem - it's about the influences by and references to the poem in US contemporary culture.
It seems that wiki now confuses US pop culture with actual commentary and comment on the subject being discussed - never mind eh, kids? you don't need to know anything about Gunga Din except some band from somewheresville, Kentucky. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.6.147.186 ( talk) 01:14, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
This poem is misrepresented in the opening paragraph. The poem does not celebrate "the virtues of a non-European." The poem portrays Gunga Din as using his position as water carrier to hold power over his ostensible masters. The narrator ironically notes that Gunga Din "was white, clear white, inside" for treating men sadistically when they were at his mercy. As the narrator lay injured, Gunga Din gave him a drink of swamp water, and the narrator mused that they would meet again in Hell. Vvevo ( talk) 09:27, 11 August 2009 (UTC)
"Like several Kipling poems, it celebrates the virtues of a non-European while revealing the racism[?] of a colonial infantryman..."
I'm sorry, but even if I'm breaking all the rules here, I simply must contest such a statement! There wasn't any such thing as what we now know as "racism" in the infantryman's mind, not a trace of it. He had no concept of prejudice against the members of that sister race, "the heathens" -- those whom he considered, quite morally and honorably, to be decent, quite admirable members of an exotic clan. The notion that all Homo sapiens might share an equal "pedigree" was as inconceivable an idea to him as imagining him himself to be the equal of a lord, a peer of the realm! How could he possibly have fathomed, much less credited, such a thought? He, like all Englishmen, good or bad, sane or mad, enlightened or benighted, considered his wealthy, well-established, anti-papist, Christian, invincible, mercantile world empire to be quite perfectly right, and ALL others unfortunately misguided and equally unfortunately, quite destitute; in fact, perishing in their millions, ten million in one year, not once, but with every periodic famine, of starvation and disease. This is all quite factual and worthy of profound pity, even to us third-millennium "egalitarian" capitalists. He was up to his neck in problem-solving for a people he couldn't imagine befriending, only pitying. He lived in a cloud of strictly, strongly, *class-minded* ideals, those of his country's finest philosophers, theologians, poets, statesmen, political leaders, etc. England's finest, most honorable, and most brilliant, including, even, the radical, notoriously free thinking Darwin. Poor, helpless heathens were dropping like flies all around him, not from anything England (that proudest and most unquestionably glorious of empires!) was doing, but from sheer penury. He had no inkling that White supremacy could be questioned, much less erroneous. Of course according to his upbringing, knowledge, and general outlook on the world at large and its peoples, the heathens were inferior to him, as to all Caucasians, and probably many unknown races on his imaginary scale of superiority, but he was by no means against them; he was for them! The inferiority of the dear heathens was to him a source of dreadful, but incorrigible pain. Would that Queen Victoria, their mutual empress, and all of her ministers, wealth, and power could correct them and their evils, and convert them all to Christ, health, wealth, and glory! Believe me, that is not prejudice in the least. Haven't you read "The White Man's Burden"? Do you imagine the British were trying, or wanted, to harm India? They were helping the people of the subcontinent in full awareness of, and, out of pious duty, in spite of, the backlash of misunderstanding, ingratitude, bitterness, and resentment, even warfare, it was likely to arouse among their "inferiors". (Tangentially, I'm going to fix "several Kipling" right now.) Unfree ( talk) 06:02, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
Good to see it's been changed, but it still makes the very incorrect statement that White Man's Burden is, by contrast, racist. A common mistake, despite its text clearly being thoroughly pro-Indian. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.182.149.81 ( talk) 23:59, 13 March 2013 (UTC)
I wonder whether anybody shares my hunch that "Gawd" was a way of saying what sort of mood it was uttered in, and more particularly, that it was a pronunciation well understood by the English audience, and by many fewer Americans, to be the way upper-class priests pronounced "God" in their loftiest accent, the one they put on and off with their vestments. Why would he be in such a mood? (Think.) Unfree ( talk) 06:35, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
I think reference should be made to the Neil Diamond 1970 song, 'Done Too Soon', which contains this memorable juxtaposition, 'Ho Chi Minh Gunga Din'. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fdmario ( talk • contribs) 19:35, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
I believe that the full text of the poem should be included in wikipedia, others do not. Other Poems include the full text, articles on artwork include reproduction of the pieces, articles on songs have lyrics, and wiki has become a facebook of pop culture. This Poem's text should be included. Geeperzcreeperz 01:04, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
I don't believe the full text is necessary. It is in Wikisource, which is linked. Figureofnine ( talk) 01:28, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Suggestion: Whether or not the text of the poem is removed, you need better sourcing related directly to the poem, its background, etc. Too much of this article deals with modern-day trivia. Figureofnine ( talk) 01:31, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Response to third opinion request: |
It seems unnecessary to me to include the entire poem in the article, especially considering it is available elsewhere. Looking at other poem articles (such as any in Category:1892 poems, of which this article is a member), none of them list the whole poem. For consistency's sake, I would say the poem should be removed from the article. SnottyWong confabulate 20:25, 2 September 2010 (UTC)— SnottyWong gab 20:49, 2 September 2010 (UTC) |
GENTLEMEN, I CALL YOUR ATTENTION TO THE PAGES: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Poetry#Individual_poems and the supporting page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:L%26P I assert that you are in fact vandalizing a project page. 23:33, 11 September 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Geeperzcreeperz ( talk • contribs)
Why does Gungadin redirect to the film and not here? Martinevans123 ( talk) 09:43, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
The statement that the "English soldiers who order Din around and beat him for not bringing them water fast enough are presented as being callous and shallow, and ultimately inferior to him" is not correct, for several reasons. Firstly it is British not English soldiers; secondly the poem refers to one soldier not multiple; thirdly the poem does not represent the soldier as callous and shallow, but perhaps as callous.????
Two items here state that Gunga Din (or Deen) had an earlier literary incarnation by others before Kipling used the name in his poem:
THE KIPLING JOURNAL 3
The Original Gunga Deen
by LIEUT.-GENERAL SIR GEORGE MacMUNN
http://www.kiplingjournal.com/textfiles/KJ066.txt
AND
Arthur Lawrence, Benjamin William Findon. "Sir Arthur Sullivan: life-story, letters, and reminiscences" (London : J. Bowden, 1899), p.363
"He [E. A. P. Hobday] has also written some songs (My bearer, Gungadeen for instance)"
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/50711514/edmund-arthur_ponsonby-hobday — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.150.38.110 ( talk) 12:12, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Gunga Din article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||
|
It seems to me that this article should be split into two;
Gunga Din -- the default article, about the
Rudyard Kipling poem.
and
Gunga Din (film) -- an article about the RKO film.
-- HobbesPDX 20:24, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
I dont think that this movie was even worth watching What about yall.
I thought it was okay as long as you didn't expect it to stick closely to the poem
I Loved this movie back in the day. So neutrality of article is disputed because you do not like the movie? I don't get it. There. Removed Neutrality Disputed tag.
Wasn't there the Bold textGunga Diner from Watchmen
The poem contains non-English words which could use some explanation: bhisti, hitherao, Panee lao, juldee, dooli Bastie 15:33, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
Intro note currently notes an Iranian author using Gunga Din as a pen name, named Ali Mirdrekvandi. It's a red link and he gets 206 Google hits including Wikipedia mirrors of this article. I'll remove the intro note; feel free to re-add if the 206-hits guy is notable. Tempshill 00:31, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
"The name 'Gunga Din' is sarcastically used[citation needed] in the musical instrument world;" -- if this is original reporting, surely no citation is needed? I can vouch for the term being used, at least in the UK. It would also be used to criticize a performance, "I sounded like Gunga Din up there." -- Rfsmit 17:26, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
This article, as written, is not about the poem - it's about the influences by and references to the poem in US contemporary culture.
It seems that wiki now confuses US pop culture with actual commentary and comment on the subject being discussed - never mind eh, kids? you don't need to know anything about Gunga Din except some band from somewheresville, Kentucky. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.6.147.186 ( talk) 01:14, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
This poem is misrepresented in the opening paragraph. The poem does not celebrate "the virtues of a non-European." The poem portrays Gunga Din as using his position as water carrier to hold power over his ostensible masters. The narrator ironically notes that Gunga Din "was white, clear white, inside" for treating men sadistically when they were at his mercy. As the narrator lay injured, Gunga Din gave him a drink of swamp water, and the narrator mused that they would meet again in Hell. Vvevo ( talk) 09:27, 11 August 2009 (UTC)
"Like several Kipling poems, it celebrates the virtues of a non-European while revealing the racism[?] of a colonial infantryman..."
I'm sorry, but even if I'm breaking all the rules here, I simply must contest such a statement! There wasn't any such thing as what we now know as "racism" in the infantryman's mind, not a trace of it. He had no concept of prejudice against the members of that sister race, "the heathens" -- those whom he considered, quite morally and honorably, to be decent, quite admirable members of an exotic clan. The notion that all Homo sapiens might share an equal "pedigree" was as inconceivable an idea to him as imagining him himself to be the equal of a lord, a peer of the realm! How could he possibly have fathomed, much less credited, such a thought? He, like all Englishmen, good or bad, sane or mad, enlightened or benighted, considered his wealthy, well-established, anti-papist, Christian, invincible, mercantile world empire to be quite perfectly right, and ALL others unfortunately misguided and equally unfortunately, quite destitute; in fact, perishing in their millions, ten million in one year, not once, but with every periodic famine, of starvation and disease. This is all quite factual and worthy of profound pity, even to us third-millennium "egalitarian" capitalists. He was up to his neck in problem-solving for a people he couldn't imagine befriending, only pitying. He lived in a cloud of strictly, strongly, *class-minded* ideals, those of his country's finest philosophers, theologians, poets, statesmen, political leaders, etc. England's finest, most honorable, and most brilliant, including, even, the radical, notoriously free thinking Darwin. Poor, helpless heathens were dropping like flies all around him, not from anything England (that proudest and most unquestionably glorious of empires!) was doing, but from sheer penury. He had no inkling that White supremacy could be questioned, much less erroneous. Of course according to his upbringing, knowledge, and general outlook on the world at large and its peoples, the heathens were inferior to him, as to all Caucasians, and probably many unknown races on his imaginary scale of superiority, but he was by no means against them; he was for them! The inferiority of the dear heathens was to him a source of dreadful, but incorrigible pain. Would that Queen Victoria, their mutual empress, and all of her ministers, wealth, and power could correct them and their evils, and convert them all to Christ, health, wealth, and glory! Believe me, that is not prejudice in the least. Haven't you read "The White Man's Burden"? Do you imagine the British were trying, or wanted, to harm India? They were helping the people of the subcontinent in full awareness of, and, out of pious duty, in spite of, the backlash of misunderstanding, ingratitude, bitterness, and resentment, even warfare, it was likely to arouse among their "inferiors". (Tangentially, I'm going to fix "several Kipling" right now.) Unfree ( talk) 06:02, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
Good to see it's been changed, but it still makes the very incorrect statement that White Man's Burden is, by contrast, racist. A common mistake, despite its text clearly being thoroughly pro-Indian. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.182.149.81 ( talk) 23:59, 13 March 2013 (UTC)
I wonder whether anybody shares my hunch that "Gawd" was a way of saying what sort of mood it was uttered in, and more particularly, that it was a pronunciation well understood by the English audience, and by many fewer Americans, to be the way upper-class priests pronounced "God" in their loftiest accent, the one they put on and off with their vestments. Why would he be in such a mood? (Think.) Unfree ( talk) 06:35, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
I think reference should be made to the Neil Diamond 1970 song, 'Done Too Soon', which contains this memorable juxtaposition, 'Ho Chi Minh Gunga Din'. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fdmario ( talk • contribs) 19:35, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
I believe that the full text of the poem should be included in wikipedia, others do not. Other Poems include the full text, articles on artwork include reproduction of the pieces, articles on songs have lyrics, and wiki has become a facebook of pop culture. This Poem's text should be included. Geeperzcreeperz 01:04, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
I don't believe the full text is necessary. It is in Wikisource, which is linked. Figureofnine ( talk) 01:28, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Suggestion: Whether or not the text of the poem is removed, you need better sourcing related directly to the poem, its background, etc. Too much of this article deals with modern-day trivia. Figureofnine ( talk) 01:31, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Response to third opinion request: |
It seems unnecessary to me to include the entire poem in the article, especially considering it is available elsewhere. Looking at other poem articles (such as any in Category:1892 poems, of which this article is a member), none of them list the whole poem. For consistency's sake, I would say the poem should be removed from the article. SnottyWong confabulate 20:25, 2 September 2010 (UTC)— SnottyWong gab 20:49, 2 September 2010 (UTC) |
GENTLEMEN, I CALL YOUR ATTENTION TO THE PAGES: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Poetry#Individual_poems and the supporting page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:L%26P I assert that you are in fact vandalizing a project page. 23:33, 11 September 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Geeperzcreeperz ( talk • contribs)
Why does Gungadin redirect to the film and not here? Martinevans123 ( talk) 09:43, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
The statement that the "English soldiers who order Din around and beat him for not bringing them water fast enough are presented as being callous and shallow, and ultimately inferior to him" is not correct, for several reasons. Firstly it is British not English soldiers; secondly the poem refers to one soldier not multiple; thirdly the poem does not represent the soldier as callous and shallow, but perhaps as callous.????
Two items here state that Gunga Din (or Deen) had an earlier literary incarnation by others before Kipling used the name in his poem:
THE KIPLING JOURNAL 3
The Original Gunga Deen
by LIEUT.-GENERAL SIR GEORGE MacMUNN
http://www.kiplingjournal.com/textfiles/KJ066.txt
AND
Arthur Lawrence, Benjamin William Findon. "Sir Arthur Sullivan: life-story, letters, and reminiscences" (London : J. Bowden, 1899), p.363
"He [E. A. P. Hobday] has also written some songs (My bearer, Gungadeen for instance)"
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/50711514/edmund-arthur_ponsonby-hobday — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.150.38.110 ( talk) 12:12, 17 March 2021 (UTC)