Gunga Din

 

Sam Jaffe, as Gunga Din

Just saw last part of the 1939 movie, “Gunga Din.” I looked it up and it was an adaptation of a poem by the same name by Rudyard Kipling written in 1890.  The setting is 19^th century India, then a colonial possession of Britain.  Gunga Din is a water carrier for the army who is abused and humiliated as an inferior. Kipling’s poem tells the story of how during a battle, Gunga Din saves the life of the narrator, and after carrying him to safety is shot and killed. It concludes with the lines:

 

Tho I’ve belted you an’ flayed you,

By the livin’ Gawd that made you,

You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din.

 

I remember growing up, when someone would do something generous or brave, my mother would repeat that last line: “You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din.” I never knew where it came from.

 

The movie version softens the abuse shown to Gunga Din and portrays the British army as honorable defenders of the realm, although blind to the suffering of the Indian people, but I suppose that was the best Hollywood could do in 1939. It’s instructive to read Kipling’s poem though, because he doesn’t pull any punches.