essay about the jungle book

“The Jungle Book” by Rudyard Kipling Essay (Critical Writing)

There is a great number of different masterpieces of literature in the world. Each of them describes some peculiar phenomenon or event. The majority of books are devoted to human beings and their feelings and emotions. There are, however, some works which are devoted to animals and their touching allegiance to people. Being very popular, this issue has always interested people. However, there are not many works which manage to combine description of the life of human beings, animals behaviour and visions of nature, trying to show the authors way of to reflect the real world. One of these works is called The Jungle Book and is written by Rudyard Kipling.

Devoted to the description of the life of a human being, the book, though, manages to combine this description with the visions of nature of the jungle and the laws according to which animals live there.

The main character of the story is a boy called Mowgli. The main peculiarity of this boy is the fact that he was raised by wolves and acts according to their code. In certain period of time this fact was taken as ridiculous and impossible. However, boys like Mowgli were found. That is why, it is possible to say that Kipling created a very interesting story which could be based on some real facts. Mowgli is able to understand animals and communicate with them, following the rules accepted in the jungle. All these facts make him a unique character who is very interesting for people.

Having created his story in the form of a tale, Kipling romanticized the life of animals and human beings in the jungle. However, there is one very important aspect of the jungle which the author describes. It is the law according to which animals live. Kipling uses the term the law of the jungle to describe existing set of codes according to which the community of wolves and other animals is structured. They all should follow it or they will not be able to survive.

All rules which are described by this law are wise and created by generations of animals in order to guarantee their survival. The law of the jungle outlines the main activity of animals, their main food and relations with other species. However, the Bandar-log do not accept these rules. They can be taken as rebels, who do not want to follow the majority. However, Kipling describes them as primitive and disorganised tribe which is not able to guarantee its prosperity. Outlining this fact, the author wants to show great importance of the law and norms which regulate behaviour in society.

Being created by Rudyard Kipling, the term the law of the jungle became very popular, though having changed its main meaning. Nowadays, it is widely used in order not to describe some set of codes accepted in society, but to show special kind of human attitude to the rest of people and his/her role in society. Everyone should take care only of himself/herself and be the strongest to survive in coherent society. This is the meaning of the term which prevails nowadays.

Besides, having read the book, it is impossible to remain indifferent. Having created interesting and fascinating world, Kipling also introduced the new term which described existence of animals in the jungle. The term the law of the jungle became the metaphor which is widely used nowadays.

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The Jungle Book

Rudyard kipling.

Welcome to the LitCharts study guide on Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book . Created by the original team behind SparkNotes, LitCharts are the world's best literature guides.

The Jungle Book: Introduction

The jungle book: plot summary, the jungle book: detailed summary & analysis, the jungle book: themes, the jungle book: quotes, the jungle book: characters, the jungle book: symbols, the jungle book: literary devices, the jungle book: theme wheel, brief biography of rudyard kipling.

Historical Context of The Jungle Book

Other books related to the jungle book.

• Full Title: The Jungle Book
• When Written: 1893–1894
• Where Written: Vermont, U.S.A.
• When Published: 1894
• Literary Period: Golden Age of Children’s Literature
• Genre: Fable, Children’s Literature
• Setting: British India
• Climax: Mowgli tricks and kills the Tiger Shere Khan. However, the villagers decide he must be a sorcerer, and they exile him from the village.
• Antagonist: Shere Khan
• Point of View: First Person and Third Person

Extra Credit for The Jungle Book

Stage Adaptation. Kipling wrote a stage version of The Jungle Book, but he never published it.

Help from Family. John Lockwood Kipling, Rudyard’s father, drew many of the illustrations that accompanied the original publications of stories later collected as The Jungle Book .

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Works cited

• American Heritage. (2021). In Dictionary.com. Retrieved March 20, 2022, from https://www.dictionary.com/browse/american-heritage
• Essa, A. (2020). Political Beliefs and Literary Themes in Kipling's Work. All About History. Retrieved March 20, 2022, from https://www.historyanswers.co.uk/people-politics/political-beliefs-and-literary-themes-in-kiplings-work/
• McClure, J. (1988). Kipling and the Jungle Book: A Sourcebook. Routledge.
• Paffard, M. (2016). Rudyard Kipling. Bloomsbury Publishing.
• Raskin, J. (1961). The Law in the Jungle: The Psychological Basis of the Jungle Books. University of California Press.
• Seon, P. (2018). The Jungle Book and the Law of the Jungle. Bloom's Literary Criticism.
• Stewart, J. (1994). Kipling's Law: A Study of His Philosophy of Life. Susquehanna University Press.
• Wilson, A. (1977). The Strange Ride of Rudyard Kipling: His Life and Works. Viking Press.
• Wray, R. B. (1971). Kipling's Mind and Art: Selected Critical Essays. Manchester University Press.
• Zipes, J. (1988). The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood. New York: Routledge.

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The Jungle Book

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A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

“Mowgli’s Brothers”

“Kaa’s Hunting”

“Tiger! Tiger!”

“The White Seal”

“Rikki-tikki-tavi”

“Toomai of the Elephants”

“Her Majesty’s Servants”

Character Analysis

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Compare and contrast the “Law of the Jungle” with the rules Mowgli learns in the human village. How do their different values relate to the historical context of The Jungle Book ?

Analyze the songs and poems included at the end of each story. How do they relate to the themes of the overall stories? Why do you think Rudyard Kipling includes them?

What is the role of gender in The Jungle Book ? How are female characters portrayed? What is different about gender between human and animal characters?

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Friday File

Predicting the Staying Power of ‘The Jungle Book’

By Mary Jo Murphy

• April 7, 2016
• Share full article

117 Years Ago

You don’t have to agree with George Orwell to wonder about Hollywood’s long love affair with Rudyard Kipling. “A jingo imperialist,” “morally insensitive,” “aesthetically disgusting” and possessing “a definite strain of sadism” were among Orwell’s descriptions of him. On the other hand, “ The Jungle Book ,” whose stars are mostly animals, is at least somewhat inoculated against not only Kipling’s harshest critics but also the range of views about him that have emerged over the last century.

And so here we are with yet another adaptation of “ The Jungle Book ,” a live-action feature from Disney based on its 1967 animated classic, set to open next week, and Warner Bros. has its own version in the pipeline. It’s hard to keep track of all the film adaptations, but they date back to 1942, with one starring Sabu.

An essay in The New York Times in 1899, when Kipling was still in his prime, predicted his sticking power, and seemed in particular to get to the heart of how he would secure his place in the firmament of childhood. The essay, in what was The Saturday Review of Books and Art, was headlined “ Kipling’s Claim on Posterity ” and began like this:

“At the age of thirty-three Rudyard Kipling has attained the dignity of being a classic. In other words, he has achieved immortality.”

The essay went on to examine all aspects of Kipling’s work to see how they might be remembered, if it all. “The work of Kipling is, as a whole, of such high order that one hesitates to pronounce any of it ephemeral,” the article said.

On the other hand: “In the nature of things he cannot be to our descendants what he is to us; they will demand a fresh message adapted to their needs, and, despite all we may say, will judge him by the dispassionate, impersonal standards of ‘mere’ literature, unmoved by contemporaneous thrills of sympathy and interest.”

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Rudyard Kipling - 'The Jungle Book' Questions for Study and Discussions

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The Jungle Book is a collection of short stories by ​​ Rudyard Kipling  that has animals as main characters who teach life lessons. One of the famous characters in the fable is Mowgli, a human child who grows up with a pack ​of wolves. 

Here are a few questions for study and discussion.

Study and Discussion Questions

• What is important about the title of the collection?
• What are the conflicts in The Jungle Book ? What types of conflict (physical, moral, intellectual, or emotional) did you notice in this collection?
• How does Rudyard Kipling reveal character in the stories of The Jungle Book ?
• What are some themes? How do they relate to the plots and characters?
• What are some symbols in the stories of The Jungle Book ? How do they relate to the plots and characters?
• Are the characters consistent in their actions? Which of the characters are fully developed? How? Why?
• Do you find the characters likable? Would you want to meet any of the characters? Which one(s)? Why?
• How does Mowgli's upbringing affect how his character develops as a human being?
• Do the stories in this collection meet (or exceed) your expectations? How? Why?
• What is the central/primary purpose of this collection of stories? Is the purpose important or meaningful?
• How essential is the setting to the stories? Could the story have taken place anywhere else?
• How important is friendship and/or camaraderie to The Jungle Book ?
• Compare/contrast The Jungle Book with other works by Rudyard Kipling? How does ​ The Jungle Book fit into Kipling's body of works?
• Would you recommend The Jungle Book to a friend?
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The Jungle Book

by Rudyard Kipling

The jungle book literary elements.

Adventure, Children's Fiction

Setting and Context

India during British colonial rule; predominantly in the jungle but also in villages and a small town

Narrator and Point of View

Third-person narrator who reflects the point of view of many characters

Tone and Mood

Ranges from loving, fun, and happy to threatening, ominous, and murderous

Protagonist and Antagonist

Mowgli, and the Pack including Baloo, Bagheera, and Kaa, are the protagonists; Shere Khan, the red dogs, and Man are the antagonists. Rikki-tiki-tavi is the protagonist, Nag and Nagaina the cobras the antagonists. Other stories feature their own protagonists and antagonists.

Major Conflict

Mowgli's battle with Shere Khan, the Pack's battle with the red dogs, the Jungle's conflict with Man the hunter, Mowgli's conflict with himself regarding returning to man, Rikki-tikki-tavi's conflict with the cobras.

Killing of Shere Khan, destruction of the village, victory over the red dogs

Foreshadowing

1. The White Cobra's warning to Mowgli that death will follow the elephant head-dress he removes from the underground palace foreshadows six deaths amongst the people hunting for it. 2. Peterson Sahib tells Little Toomai knowingly that when he sees the elephants dance, he can go into all the Keddahs he wants, foreshadowing what the boy is about the observe. 3. Sahi the porcupine tells Mowgli the yams are dying up, foreshadowing the drought that is to come.

Understatement

1. Rikki-tikki-tavi is told that to follow a snake into a burrow can be "dangerous," which understates the life-threatening nature of this action. 2. Kaa's strength "lay in his hug" (33).

1. The entire structure of the Jungle with its rules, laws, and councils is an allusion to the human world. The council has a leader, and all members of the community get a vote when they are old enough. They enter conflict when it is necessary to keep out an invading army (such as the red dogs) and they engage everyone in the battle in some way. They have rules, laws, and traditions passed down the generations and if anyone breaks these laws they are made to pay. There are characters who are obviously generals and others who are foot soldiers, but the Jungle lives basically as a democratic state with benevolent rule. This reflects Kipling's view of India, in that the British leaders maintain safety and democracy that keeps the Indians safe and in line. 2. Emperor Theodore, otherwise known as Tewodros II, leader of Ethiopia (1855-1868), committed suicide after failing to triumph in a clash with the English at Magdala. 3. Magellan, the great explorer, is also alluded to.

See Imagery

1. Mowgli believes that if he ever has to leave the jungle, it will be the jungle that makes him go, but as both Akela and Baloo tell him, it is Mowgli who makes Mowgli return to man.

Parallelism

1. Kipling parallels the way in which Akela inspires his pack to follow his lead and the way Shere Khan has collected followers to illustrate the difference between Akela's benevolent leadership and Shere Khan's dishonesty and bullying. This also shows the difference between Akela's intentions, which are for the good of the future of the Pack, and Shere Khan's, which are to get the kill he wants regardless of whether it is good for anyone else or outside of the boundaries of Jungle Law.

Metonymy and Synecdoche

1. There is metonymy throughout the book when it comes to the Jungle. The Jungle decides what happens to a character, but by this Kipling actually means the characters within it, not the jungle itself. Jungle Law is also law that has been passed down through generations of jungle dwellers. 2. Akela assures the Pack that if they let Mowgli go, he will not "bare one tooth against ye" (20). While this could be literal, it is more synecdochal in that the tooth is a stand in for his entire body. 3. In the sentence, "Never a cobra dared show its head inside the walls" (106), the head is a synecdoche of the entire creature.

Personification

1. "The Ankus will do my work! It is death! It is death! It is death!" ("The King's Ankus") 2. "I am an evil man-cub, and stomach is sad in me" (Mowgli, 47) 3. "The sun makes the rocks dance in heat..." (57) 4. "A small crack might let in some wisdom" (Sahi to Mowgli, 150)

The Jungle Book Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for The Jungle Book is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

In "The Jungle Book" by Rudyard Kipling, various literary devices enhance the storytelling. Here are some examples of similes, metaphors, idioms, and personification found in the text: Similes Comparisons using "like" or "as" are often used to...

Who was purun Dass

I think he's from the second Jungle Book. Purun Dass .was a high caste Brahmin, whose father had been an important official in an old-fashioned Hindu Court.

The jungle book

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Study Guide for The Jungle Book

The Jungle Book study guide contains a biography of Rudyard Kipling, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About The Jungle Book
• The Jungle Book Summary
• Character List

Essays for The Jungle Book

The Jungle Book essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling.

• War and Womanhood in Rudyard Kipling’s Mary Postgate (1915)
• Loyalty in “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi”

Lesson Plan for The Jungle Book

• About the Author
• Study Objectives
• Common Core Standards
• Introduction to The Jungle Book
• Relationship to Other Books
• Bringing in Technology
• Notes to the Teacher
• Related Links
• The Jungle Book Bibliography