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A Red Bull and a Colonel on a Horse
A Short Review of Kim by Rudyard Kipling*
The book Kim* was a difficult read for me, but I finished it, and I am glad I attempted it. Kimball O’Hara is an orphaned white boy in India. He has no home and no rules to live by. He sneaks around in the dark and overhears many secrets. Before his father died though, he told Kim a story that a red bull and a colonel on a horse would come for him.
Kim meets an old Tibetan lama priest and becomes his chela (begging boy), They are bound together as they travel on a quest to find the healing River of the Arrow. They take a train and Kim cons his way out of paying the full fair. They end up staying at a farmer’s house and their Hindu priest sees the red bull in Kim’s future also but says that it comes with war.
The lama priest and Kim begin walking and stopping at every river they come across to see if it is the River of the Arrow the lama priest seeks. They meet an elderly village headman who throws them a party and Kim’s red bull comes up again in conversation as they meet an old soldier who fought in the Revolt of 1857.
Along the road they meet a wealthy Kulu woman who takes care of them for a while, until Kim finds a regiment of soldiers on a green field with a red bull on their flag. They convince the lama priest to let Kim go to the…
