Dale Nelson Wrote:
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> I think Jack and Mrs. Keith-Wessington were, at
> least once, lovers in the physical sense. Towards
> the end Pansay refers to her as "my dead and
> buried mistress." "Mistress," to be sure, can be
> used in more innocent ways, but by this point in
> the story Jack has stopped writing of her as he
> does early (she's the one at fault, etc.) and is
> admitting his culpability.
Yes. This makes sense to me, accounting for both her extreme attachment and his fatigue.
And all this happened in a relatively short time--on board ship, if I got it right--so it reads like a very quick but passionate physical fling.
> In the background of
> the story might be the verse from 1 Corinthians 6,
> "What? know ye not that he which is joined to an
> harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be
> one flesh." Pansay might have thought that when
> he got what he wanted from his shipboard flame, by
> saying he loved her, it was a case of "Wham, bam,
> thank you ma'am" and that's it," but it wasn't.
Yes, the more you point this out, the more likely it seems.
He is a roguish cad, after all... ;^)
>
> Btw Kipling was never graphic, but he was frank
> about sexuality. There's a good story about a man
> dying of advanced syphilis, for example ("LOve o'
> Women").
>
> [
www.kiplingsociety.co.uk]
> s.htm
--Sawfish
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"The food at the new restaurant is awful, but at least the portions are large."
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