If— is a notable poem by Rudyard Kipling. It was written in 1895; the poem was first published in the Brother Square Toes chapter of Rewards and Fairies, Kipling's 1910 collection of short stories and poems. Like William Ernest Henley's Invictus, it is a memorable evocation of Victorian stoicism and the "stiff upper lip" that popular culture has made into a traditional British virtue. Its status is confirmed by the number of parodies it has inspired. Rudyard Kipling, British author Joseph Rudyard Kipling (December 30, 1865 – January 18, 1936) was a British author and poet, born in India. ... 1895 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... 1910 was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... William Ernest Henley (August 23, 1849 - July 11, 1903) was a British poet, critic and editor. ... Invictus is a short poem by the British poet William Ernest Henley, which is the source of a number of familiar clichés and quotations. ... Queen Victoria (shown here on the morning of her Accession to the Throne, June 20, 1837) gave her name to the historic era. ... A restored Stoa in Athens, Greece. ... Popular culture, or pop culture, is the vernacular (peoples) culture that prevails in a modern society. ... Virtue (Greek αρετη; Latin virtus) is the habitual, well-established, readiness or disposition of mans powers directing them to some goodness of act. ... In contemporary usage, parody is a form of satire that imitates another work of art in order to ridicule it. ...

According to Kipling in his autobiography Something Of Myself (1937), the poem was inspired by Dr Leander Starr Jameson, who in 1895 led a disastrous raid by British forces against the Boers in South Africa. [1] (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/kipling-if.html) This defeat increased the tensions that ultimately led to the Boer War. The British press, however, portrayed Jameson as a hero in the middle of the disaster, and the actual defeat as a British victory. Autobiography (from the Greek auton, self, bios, life and graphein, write) is biography, the writing of a life story, from the viewpoint of the subject. ... 1937 was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... An 1895 cartoon of Jameson from Vanity Fair Sir Leander Starr Jameson, Bt (February 9, 1853 – November 26, 1917), also known as Doctor Jim, was a British colonial statesman who was best known for his involvement in the Jameson Raid. ... 1895 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... The Jameson Raid (December 29, 1895 - January 2, 1896) was an ineffectual sortie by British irregulars into the Transvaal. ... Boer is the Afrikaans language word for farmer. ... Boer guerrillas during the Second Boer War There were two Boer wars, one in December 16, 1880-March 23, 1881 and the second from October 11, 1899-May 31, 1902 both between the British and the settlers of Dutch origin (called Boere, Afrikaners or Voortrekkers) in South Africa that put... Sir Galahad, a hero of Arthurian legend In many myths and folk tales, a hero is a man or woman (the latter often called a heroine), traditionally the protagonist of a story, legend or saga, commonly possessed of abilities or character far greater than that of a typical person, which...

If— holds the world record as the poem reprinted in more anthologies than any other. In a 1995 BBC opinion poll, it was voted the most popular poem of all time in the United Kingdom. Kipling himself noted in Something Of Myself that the poem had been "anthologised to weariness". In the twentieth century anthologies became an important part of poetry publishing, for a number of reasons. ... 1995 was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) was formed in 1927 by means of a royal charter from the Crown. ...

Reference

Chapter VII of Something of Myself (http://whitewolf.newcastle.edu.au/words/authors/K/KiplingRudyard/prose/SomethingOfMyself/myself_chap_7.html) File links The following pages link to this file: Abraham Lincoln Aristotle Ayn Rand Adolf Hitler Al Gore A Modest Proposal Articles of Confederation Arthur Schopenhauer Albert Einstein Amhrán na bhFiann Arthur Conan Doyle Ada programming language Antarctic Treaty System Andrew Jackson Andrew Johnson Adam Smith Bill Clinton Bible... Wikisource is a sister project to Wikipedia that aims to create a free wiki compendium of primary source texts in any language, as well as translations of source texts. ...