Sheila has a nice tribute to Rudyard Kipling, of whom I am also immensely fond.

People like to dismiss Kipling these days as nothing more than a dead, white, male Imperialist.  I strongly suspect that such people have never actually read any of his work, or they would quickly realize that he was perfectly well aware of the physical and moral complexities, ambiguities, hardships and injustices of the world around him (which are, in fact the subject of many of his stories and poems).  But Kipling was a realist, too, and I think his wisdom and observations will hold far longer than those of some snotty college kid who refuses to touch him on the grounds that, “Dude, it was like so unfaaaair that the British ruled India.”

As for relevance? Well, for just over a month now, the following lines have been flowing through my brain more or less constantly:

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man—
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began:—
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will bum,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!