KIM XVI -- chapter 10: COTERIES and MEDIUMS (media?)

Ventriloquy and bellyspeak: "...he was careful not to step in Huneefa's blotched, squat shadow on the boards. Witches—when their time is on them—can lay hold of the heels of a man's soul if he does that."


So what is Kim now?

(I'm not sure what else to say or ask about this chapter.  Any other thoughts?)

KIM XV - chapter 9: PRESTO, CHANGE-O!

1. Best chapter yet!  Do you disagree?  And leaning on the newly designated (by me, who is so slow on the uptake) episodic nature of the book, this story, chapter 9, is grand.  As always, I checked the number of pages in the chapter, marked down an approximate halfway point, and began reading to it to determine a good stop-point for the day.  I read right past it.  Magic, right?  And why not?  Aside from the o-so-typical designation of, shall we say, "kinetic" writing to magically carry away the reader, this chapter's theme is Magic.  Aside from the obvious magic performed by Mr. Lurgan, what other such feats are there?
2. I'm intrigued, greatly, by Mr. Lurgan:  "'Was that more magic?' Kim asked suspiciously. The tingle had gone from his veins; he felt unusually wide awake. // 'No, that was not magic. It was only to see if there was—a flaw in a jewel. Sometimes very fine jewels will fly all to pieces if a man holds them in his hand, and knows the proper way. That is why one must be careful before one sets them. Tell me, did you see the shape of the pot?' // 'For a little time. It began to grow like a flower from the ground.' // 'And then what did you do? I mean, how did you think?' // 'Oah! I knew it was broken, and so, I think, that was what I thought—and it was broken.' // 'Hm! Has any one ever done that same sort of magic to you before?' // 'If it was,' said Kim, 'do you think I should let it again? I should run away.' // 'And now you are not afraid—eh?' // 'Not now.' // Lurgan Sahib looked at him more closely than ever. 'I shall ask Mahbub Ali—not now, but some day later,' he muttered. 'I am pleased with you—yes; and I am pleased with you—no. You are the first that ever saved himself. I wish I knew what it was that . . . But you are right. You should not tell that—not even to me.'"  What is going on in the final bolded statements here?
3. This chapter is freaking loaded with potential metaphors and parallels.  What about the memory game?  Take a look at just as it is: a memory recall challenge.  Extend that to the circumstances around the challenge and the motives (regarding the Hindu boy, as well as regarding Kim's potential for the future) of Mr. Lurgan to initiate it.
4. And what about this Hindu boy?  He attempts the killing of his master with "white arsenic," and the Sahib doesn't even bat an eye!
5. This chapter is confusing and fully intriguing and huge.  What overall impressions did you gain from it?
6. The Lama's dream that he will only find the River of the Arrow with the help of his chela, Kim combines perfectly with the Tale of the Fettered Elephant.  Thoughts?
7. I felt pretty sure the 81 beads of the Lama's rosary would come back.  What do you make of the convergence of its usages of prayer mnemonic and abacus?
8. "Colonel Sahib, only once in a thousand years is a horse born so well fitted for the game as this our colt. And we need men."

KIM XIII -- chapter 7: The Bureau of General Misinformation

Through the Gates of Learning

1. Clearly a bildungsroman; Kim finally asks himself, and by extension the reader, the pertinent question himself, and, perhaps, opens a door for finally drawing up some shape from the elements of the story: "I go from one place to another as it might be a kick-ball. It is my kismet. No man can escape his kismet. But I am to pray to Bibi Miriam and I am a Sahib"—he looked at his boots ruefully. "No; I am Kim. This is the great world, and I am only Kim. Who is Kim?"
2. "He considered his own identity, a thing he had never done before."  How, though more significantly, why, has Kim made it this far through his life without considering his identity and abilities?  What is he likely to discover?
3. Who is Colonel Creighton?
4. "There is no sin so great as ignorance."
5. Any intention here: that as Kim and the Lama part ways for, perhaps, quite a long time, "the gates of learning" shut?  Is this a commentary on the education that will become available to Kim now that he enters the school yet leaves the Lama?  Would he have been better served, educationally-speaking, to skip school and find the river?
6. new word (for me): scrupulosity -- I would have left it, less succinctly and certainly more sibilantly, at scrupulousness.  (Along similar lines, since when is the past participle of to thrive, throve?)
7. Is Kim likely to be brainwashed while at school?  Might he go from Gryffindor to Death Eater, from the White City to Barad-dur?  Will he who was once a native, be able to command like all the rest of his racist sahib classmates?
8. "Men are like horses. At certain times they need salt, and if that salt is not in the mangers they will lick it up from the earth."