The fascination of India, adventure in exotic places, the British at home and at war, love complicated by entanglements, and unexpected endings. This is the stuff of Rudyard Kipling's short stories, always marked by a variety of subjects and versatility, of style that make him, as W. Somerset Maugham declared, "the best short story, writer that our country can boast." This superb collection presents twenty of his finest tales, the outstanding classics of a master craftsman,
ranging from "The Man Who Would Be King," a story of imperialist control devoid of moral authority, with its wonderful rogues Peachy and Dan, to a youthful tale of his own unhappy childhood, "Baa Baa, Black Sheep," to themes of war in such mature stories as "Mary Postgate" and "The Gardener." Here, too, are the spooky chills of "'They,’” one of the world's greatest tales of horror. Spanning two centuries and two cultures-East and West-this magnificent collection paints imperial India in vivid, unforgettable colors, charts both fascinating landscapcs and the complex interior of the human mind, and reveals an unsurpassed imaginative force . . . a writer still powerful and undimmed by time.