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53-507: The Second Jungle Book is a sequel to The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling . First published in 1895, it features five stories about Mowgli and three unrelated stories, all but one set in India , most of which Kipling wrote while living in Vermont . All of the stories were previously published in magazines in 1894–5, often under different titles. The 1994 film The Jungle Book used it as

106-410: A blank wall (514a–b). The people watch shadows projected on the wall by things passing in front of a fire behind them and begin to ascribe forms to these shadows, using language to identify their world (514c–515a). According to the allegory, the shadows are as close as the prisoners get to viewing reality, until one of them finds his way into the outside world where he sees the actual objects that produced

159-534: A double fantasy of the child as both noble savage and embryo good citizen, to see that the Jungle Books .. give their readers a vicarious experience of adventure both as freedom and as service to a just State". Sayan Mukherjee, writing for the Book Review Circle, calls The Jungle Book "one of the most enjoyable books of my childhood and even in adulthood, highly informative as to the outlook of

212-666: A plot-driven fantasy narrative in an extended fable with talking animals and broadly sketched characters, intended to discuss the politics of the time. Yet, George MacDonald emphasized in 1893 that "A fairy tale is not an allegory." J. R. R. Tolkien 's The Lord of the Rings is another example of a well-known work mistakenly perceived as allegorical, as the author himself once stated, "...I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence. I much prefer history – true or feigned – with its varied applicability to

265-496: A source. Each story is followed by a related poem: The Jungle Book The Jungle Book is an 1894 collection of stories by the English author Rudyard Kipling . Most of the characters are animals such as Shere Khan the tiger and Baloo the bear, though a principal character is the boy or "man-cub" Mowgli , who is raised in the jungle by wolves. Most stories are set in a forest in India ; one place mentioned repeatedly

318-523: A stage adaptation in 2004, first produced by the Birmingham Old Rep in 2004 and published in 2007 by Nick Hern Books . In 2021 BBC Radio 4 broadcast an adaptation by Ayeesha Menon which resets the story as a "gangland coming-of-age fable" in modern India. Allegory Writers and speakers typically use allegories to convey (semi-) hidden or complex meanings through symbolic figures, actions, imagery, or events, which together create

371-442: Is "Seeonee" ( Seoni ), in the central state of Madhya Pradesh . A major theme in the book is abandonment followed by fostering, as in the life of Mowgli, echoing Kipling's own childhood. The theme is echoed in the triumph of protagonists including Rikki-Tikki-Tavi and The White Seal over their enemies, as well as Mowgli's. Another important theme is of law and freedom; the stories are not about animal behaviour , still less about

424-418: Is a figurative approach, relying on a set of concepts associated with key terms in order to create an allegorical decoding of the text." Allegory has an ability to freeze the temporality of a story, while infusing it with a spiritual context. Mediaeval thinking accepted allegory as having a reality underlying any rhetorical or fictional uses. The allegory was as true as the facts of surface appearances. Thus,

477-509: Is complex, since it demands we observe the distinction between two often conflated uses of the Greek verb "allēgoreīn," which can mean both "to speak allegorically" and "to interpret allegorically." In the case of "interpreting allegorically," Theagenes appears to be our earliest example. Presumably in response to proto-philosophical moral critiques of Homer (e.g., Xenophanes fr. 11 Diels-Kranz ), Theagenes proposed symbolic interpretations whereby

530-665: The Jataka tales . For example, an older moral-filled mongoose and snake version of the " Rikki-Tikki-Tavi " story by Kipling is found in Book 5 of Panchatantra . In a letter to the American author Edward Everett Hale , Kipling wrote: The idea of beast-tales seems to me new in that it is a most ancient and long forgotten idea. The really fascinating tales are those that the Bodhisat tells of his previous incarnations ending always with

583-460: The Darwinian struggle for survival, but about human archetypes in animal form. They teach respect for authority, obedience, and knowing one's place in society with "the law of the jungle", but the stories also illustrate the freedom to move between different worlds, such as when Mowgli moves between the jungle and the village. Critics have also noted the essential wildness and lawless energies in

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636-536: The Hugo Award-winning science fiction novel, Stranger in a Strange Land (1961), when his wife, Virginia , suggested a new version of The Jungle Book , but with a child raised by Martians instead of wolves. Neil Gaiman 's The Graveyard Book (2008) is inspired by The Jungle Book . It follows a baby boy who is found and brought up by the dead in a cemetery. It has many scenes that can be traced to Kipling, but with Gaiman's dark twist. In music,

689-531: The Jungle Book cycle (1958) was written by the Australian composer Percy Grainger , an avid Kipling reader. It consists of quotations from the book, set as choral pieces and solos for soprano, tenor or baritone. The French composer Charles Koechlin wrote several symphonic works inspired by the book. BBC Radio broadcast an adaptation on 14 February 1994 and released it as a BBC audiobook in 2008. It

742-465: The 12th-century works of Hugh of St Victor and Edward Topsell 's Historie of Foure-footed Beastes (London, 1607, 1653) and its replacement in the study of nature with methods of categorisation and mathematics by such figures as naturalist John Ray and the astronomer Galileo is thought to mark the beginnings of early modern science. Since meaningful stories are nearly always applicable to larger issues, allegories may be read into many stories which

795-608: The British on their 'native population'". The academic Jopi Nyman argued in 2001 that the book formed part of the construction of " colonial English national identity" within Kipling's " imperial project ". In Nyman's view, nation, race and class are mapped out in the stories, contributing to "an imagining of Englishness" as a site of power and racial superiority. Nyman suggested that The Jungle Book' s monkeys and snakes represent "colonial animals" and "racialized Others" within

848-639: The Gods of the Iliad actually stood for physical elements. So, Hephestus represents Fire, for instance (for which see fr. A2 in Diels-Kranz ). Some scholars, however, argue that Pherecydes cosmogonic writings anticipated Theagenes allegorical work, illustrated especially by his early placement of Time (Chronos) in his genealogy of the gods, which is thought to be a reinterpretation of the titan Kronos, from more traditional genealogies. In classical literature two of

901-706: The Indian jungle, whereas the White Seal promotes "'truly English' identities in the nationalist allegory" of that story. Swati Singh, in his Secret History of the Jungle Book , notes that the tone is like that of Indian folklore, fable-like, and that critics have speculated that the Kipling may have heard similar stories from his Hindu bearer and his Portuguese ayah (nanny) during his childhood in India. Singh observes, too, that Kipling wove "magic and fantasy" into

954-590: The Jungle", for example, lay down rules for the safety of individuals, families, and communities. Kipling put in them nearly everything he knew or "heard or dreamed about the Indian jungle". Other readers have interpreted the work as allegories of the politics and society of the time. The stories in The Jungle Book were inspired in part by the ancient Indian fable texts such as the Panchatantra and

1007-554: The Papal Bull Unam Sanctam (1302) presents themes of the unity of Christendom with the pope as its head in which the allegorical details of the metaphors are adduced as facts on which is based a demonstration with the vocabulary of logic: " Therefore of this one and only Church there is one body and one head—not two heads as if it were a monster... If, then, the Greeks or others say that they were not committed to

1060-626: The Promised Land. Also allegorical is Ezekiel 16 and 17, wherein the capture of that same vine by the mighty Eagle represents Israel's exile to Babylon. Allegorical interpretation of the Bible was a common early Christian practice and continues. For example, the recently re-discovered Fourth Commentary on the Gospels by Fortunatianus of Aquileia has a comment by its English translator: "The principal characteristic of Fortunatianus' exegesis

1113-628: The Russian of the Pribilof Islands . The early editions were illustrated with drawings in the text by John Lockwood Kipling (Rudyard's father), and the American artists W. H. Drake and Paul Frenzeny . The book has appeared in over 500 print editions, and over 100 audiobooks. It has been translated into at least 36 languages. In 2024, page proofs of the book were donated to Cambridge University Library . Critics such as Harry Ricketts have observed that Kipling returns repeatedly to

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1166-452: The assembly", which originates from ἀγορά ( agora ), "assembly". Northrop Frye discussed what he termed a "continuum of allegory", a spectrum that ranges from what he termed the "naive allegory" of the likes of The Faerie Queene , to the more private allegories of modern paradox literature . In this perspective, the characters in a "naive" allegory are not fully three-dimensional, for each aspect of their individual personalities and of

1219-429: The author may not have recognized. This is allegoresis, or the act of reading a story as an allegory. Examples of allegory in popular culture that may or may not have been intended include the works of Bertolt Brecht , and even some works of science fiction and fantasy, such as The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis . The story of the apple falling onto Isaac Newton 's head is another famous allegory. It simplified

1272-493: The author's permission for the use of the Memory Game from Kim in his scheme to develop the morale and fitness of working-class youths in cities. Akela , the head wolf in The Jungle Book , has become a senior figure in the movement; the name is traditionally adopted by the leader of each Cub Scout pack . The Jungle Book has been adapted many times in a wide variety of media. In literature, Robert Heinlein wrote

1325-496: The beautiful moral. Most of the native hunters in India today think pretty much along the lines of an animal's brain and I have "cribbed" freely from their tales. In a letter written and signed by Kipling in or around 1895, states Alison Flood in The Guardian , Kipling confesses to borrowing ideas and stories in the Jungle Book : "I am afraid that all that code in its outlines has been manufactured to meet 'the necessities of

1378-519: The best-known allegories are the Cave in Plato's The Republic (Book VII) and the story of the stomach and its members in the speech of Menenius Agrippa ( Livy ii. 32). Among the best-known examples of allegory, Plato 's Allegory of the Cave , forms a part of his larger work The Republic . In this allegory, Plato describes a group of people who have lived chained in a cave all of their lives, facing

1431-489: The book as a whole, such as Zoltán Korda 's 1942 film , Disney 's 1967 animated film and its 2016 remake . Other adaptations include the Russian adaptation named Mowgli , published as Adventures of Mowgli in the US, an animation released between 1967 and 1971, and combined into a single 96-minute feature film in 1973, and the 1989 Italian-Japanese anime The Jungle Book: Adventures of Mogwli . Stuart Paterson wrote

1484-655: The book would not have ended with the Ring being destroyed but rather with an arms race in which various powers would try to obtain such a Ring for themselves. Then Tolkien went on to outline an alternative plot for "Lord of The Rings", as it would have been written had such an allegory been intended, and which would have made the book into a dystopia . While all this does not mean Tolkien's works may not be treated as having allegorical themes, especially when reinterpreted through postmodern sensibilities, it at least suggests that none were conscious in his writings. This further reinforces

1537-616: The care of Peter and his successors, they necessarily confess that they are not of the sheep of Christ." This text also demonstrates the frequent use of allegory in religious texts during the Mediaeval Period, following the tradition and example of the Bible. In the late 15th century, the enigmatic Hypnerotomachia , with its elaborate woodcut illustrations, shows the influence of themed pageants and masques on contemporary allegorical representation, as humanist dialectic conveyed them. The denial of medieval allegory as found in

1590-418: The case': though a little of it is bodily taken from (Southern) Esquimaux rules for the division of spoils. In fact, it is extremely possible that I have helped myself promiscuously but at present cannot remember from whose stories I have stolen". Shere Khan , the main antagonist of the story, is named after the historical Afghan Emperor Sher Shah Suri . Kipling lived in India as a child, and most of

1643-471: The conclusion; and Mowgli is again rejected at the end of "Tiger! Tiger!", but each time is compensated by "a queue of would-be foster-parents" including the wolves, Baloo, Bagheera and Kaa. In Ricketts's view, the power that Mowgli has over all these characters who compete for his affection is part of the book's appeal to children. The historian of India Philip Mason similarly emphasises the Mowgli myth, where

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1696-405: The events that befall them embodies some moral quality or other abstraction; the author has selected the allegory first, and the details merely flesh it out. The origins of allegory can be traced at least back to Homer in his "quasi-allegorical" use of personifications of, e.g., Terror (Deimos) and Fear (Phobos) at Il. 115 f. The title of "first allegorist", however, is usually awarded to whoever

1749-409: The fostered hero, "the odd man out among wolves and men alike", eventually triumphs over his enemies. Mason notes that both Rikki-Tikki-Tavi and The White Seal do much the same. The novelist Marghanita Laski argued that the purpose of the stories was not to teach about animals but to create human archetypes through the animal characters, with lessons of respect for authority. She noted that Kipling

1802-475: The idea of gravity by depicting a simple way it was supposedly discovered. It also made the scientific revelation well known by condensing the theory into a short tale. While allegoresis may make discovery of allegory in any work, not every resonant work of modern fiction is allegorical, and some are clearly not intended to be viewed this way. According to Henry Littlefield's 1964 article, L. Frank Baum 's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz , may be readily understood as

1855-662: The information a fifth-century upper-class male needed to know into an allegory of the wedding of Mercury and Philologia , with the seven liberal arts the young man needed to know as guests. Also, the Neoplatonic philosophy developed a type of allegorical reading of Homer and Plato. Other early allegories are found in the Hebrew Bible , such as the extended metaphor in Psalm 80 of the vine and its impressive spread and growth, representing Israel's conquest and peopling of

1908-436: The law may be highly codified, but that the energies are also lawless, embodying the part of human nature which is "floating, irresponsible and self-absorbed". There is a duality between the two worlds of the village and the jungle, but Mowgli, like Mang the bat, can travel between the two. The novelist and critic Angus Wilson noted that Kipling's law of the jungle was "far from Darwinian ", since no attacks were allowed at

1961-523: The moral, spiritual, or political meaning the author wishes to convey. Many allegories use personification of abstract concepts. First attested in English in 1382, the word allegory comes from Latin allegoria , the latinisation of the Greek ἀλληγορία ( allegoría ), "veiled language, figurative", literally "speaking about something else", which in turn comes from ἄλλος ( allos ), "another, different" and ἀγορεύω ( agoreuo ), "to harangue, to speak in

2014-680: The pages of Marvel Fanfare (vol. 1). These were collected in the one-shot Marvel Illustrated : The Jungle Book (2007). Bill Willingham 's comic book series, Fables , features The Jungle Book ' s Mowgli, Bagheera, and Shere Khan. Manga Classics: The Jungle Book was published by UDON Entertainment's Manga Classics imprint in June 2017. Many films have been based on one or another of Kipling's stories, including Elephant Boy (1937), Chuck Jones 's made for-TV cartoons Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (1975), The White Seal (1975), and Mowgli's Brothers (1976). Many films, too, have been made of

2067-846: The property and home he owned in Dummerston , Vermont , US . There is evidence that Kipling wrote the collection of stories for his daughter, Josephine (who died from pneumonia in 1899, aged 6); a first-edition copy of the book—including a handwritten note by the author to his young daughter—was discovered at the National Trust 's Wimpole Hall , Cambridgeshire , in 2010. The tales in the book (as well as those in The Second Jungle Book , which followed in 1895 and includes eight further stories, including five about Mowgli) are fables , using animals in an anthropomorphic manner to teach moral lessons. The verses of "The Law of

2120-555: The repeated failure of the "bully" Shere Khan; through the endless but useless talk of the Bandar-log; and through the law, which makes the jungle "an integrated whole" while enabling Mowgli's brothers to live as the "Free People". The academic Jan Montefiore commented on the book's balance of law and freedom that "you don't need to invoke Jacqueline Rose on the adult's dream of the child's innocence or Perry Nodelman's theory of children's literature colonising its readers' minds with

2173-507: The shadows. He tries to tell the people in the cave of his discovery, but they do not believe him and vehemently resist his efforts to free them so they can see for themselves (516e–518a). This allegory is, on a basic level, about a philosopher who upon finding greater knowledge outside the cave of human understanding, seeks to share it as is his duty, and the foolishness of those who would ignore him because they think themselves educated enough. In Late Antiquity Martianus Capella organized all

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2226-524: The stories are evidently set there, though it is not entirely clear where. The Kipling Society notes that "Seeonee" ( Seoni , in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh ) is mentioned several times; that the "cold lairs" must be in the jungled hills of Chittorgarh ; and that the first Mowgli story, "In the Rukh", is set in a forest reserve somewhere in North India , south of Simla . "Mowgli's Brothers"

2279-612: The stories for his daughter Josephine, and that even critics reading Kipling for signs of imperialism could not help admiring the power of his storytelling. The Jungle Book came to be used as a motivational book by the Cub Scouts , a junior element of the Scouting movement. This use of the book's universe was approved by Kipling at the request of Robert Baden-Powell , founder of the Scouting movement, who had originally asked for

2332-563: The stories include Kanha Tiger Reserve , Madhya Pradesh, and Pench National Park , near Seoni, but Kipling never visited the area. The book is arranged with a story in each chapter. Each story is followed by a poem that serves as an epigram . Many of the characters (marked *) are named simply after the Hindustani names of their species: for example, Baloo is a transliteration of Hindustani भालू/بھالو Bhālū, "bear". The characters (marked ^) from "The White Seal" are transliterations from

2385-411: The stories, reflecting the irresponsible side of human nature. The Jungle Book has remained popular, partly through its many adaptations for film and other media . Critics such as Swati Singh have noted that even critics wary of Kipling for his supposed imperialism have admired the power of his storytelling. The book has been influential in the scout movement , whose founder, Robert Baden-Powell ,

2438-426: The theme of the abandoned and fostered child, recalling his own childhood feelings of abandonment. In his view, the enemy, Shere Khan, represents the "malevolent would-be foster-parent" who Mowgli in the end outwits and destroys, just as Kipling as a boy had to face Mrs Holloway in place of his parents. Ricketts writes that in "Mowgli's Brothers", the hero loses his human parents at the outset, and his wolf fosterers at

2491-421: The thought and experience of readers. I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but one resides in the freedom of the reader, and the other in the purposed domination of the author." Tolkien specifically resented the suggestion that the book's One Ring , which gives overwhelming power to those possessing it, was intended as an allegory of nuclear weapons . He noted that, had that been his intention,

2544-471: The water-hole when in drought. In Wilson's view, the popularity of the Mowgli stories is thus not literary but moral : the animals can follow the law easily, but Mowgli has human joys and sorrows, and the burden of making decisions. Kipling's biographer, Charles Carrington , argued that the "fables" about Mowgli illustrate truths directly, as successful fables do, through the character of Mowgli himself; through his "kindly mentors", Bagheera and Baloo; through

2597-790: Was a friend of Kipling. Percy Grainger composed his Jungle Book Cycle around quotations from the book. Rudyard Kipling's stories were first printed in magazines in 1893 and 1894; the original publications also contained hand-sketched illustrations, with some from John Lockwood Kipling , his father. Rudyard himself was born in Mumbai —then referred to as Bombay —in the western coastal Indian state of Maharashtra , where he spent his first six years of life. After around 10 years back in England , and having completed his schooling, Kipling went back to India to work for nearly 6½ years. Later on, his original stories would be written when he lived at Naulakha ,

2650-632: Was a friend of the founder of the Scout Movement , Robert Baden-Powell , who based the junior scout "Wolf Cubs" on the stories, and that Kipling admired the movement. Ricketts wrote that Kipling was obsessed by rules, a theme running throughout the stories and named explicitly as "the law of the jungle". Part of this, Ricketts supposed, was Mrs Holloway's evangelicalism, suitably transformed. The rules required obedience and "knowing your place", but also provided social relationships and "freedom to move between different worlds". Sandra Kemp observed that

2703-525: Was directed by Chris Wallis with Nisha K. Nayar as Mowgli, Eartha Kitt as Kaa, Freddie Jones as Baloo, and Jonathan Hyde as Bagheera. The music was by John Mayer . The book's text has been adapted for younger readers with comic book adaptations such as DC Comics Elseworlds ' story, " Superman: The Feral Man of Steel ", in which an infant Superman is raised by wolves, while Bagheera, Akela, and Shere Khan make appearances. Marvel Comics published several adaptations by Mary Jo Duffy and Gil Kane in

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2756-511: Was positioned in the Aravalli hills of Rajasthan (northwestern India) in an early manuscript, later changed to Seonee, and Bagheera treks from "Oodeypore" ( Udaipur ), a journey of reasonable length to Aravalli but a long way from Seoni. Seoni has a tropical savanna climate , with a dry and a rainy season. This is drier than a monsoon climate and does not support tropical rainforest. Forested parks and reserves that claim to be associated with

2809-416: Was the earliest to put forth allegorical interpretations of Homer. This approach leads to two possible answers: Theagenes of Rhegium (whom Porphyry calls the "first allegorist," Porph. Quaest. Hom. 1.240.14–241.12 Schrad.) or Pherecydes of Syros, both of whom are presumed to be active in the 6th century B.C.E., though Pherecydes is earlier and as he is often presumed to be the first writer of prose. The debate

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