Very true. Although others of the same era adopted very different, more enlightened positions. Kipling chose his political stances, many of them collossally cruel in their consequences, both in India and in Ireland. He chose to make himself so bloody problematic, for liberals of his own era, let alone ours. And he employed his literary gifts to proselytise for them.

Yet there is so much warmth and humanity in his work. Both Mark Twain and George Orwell, for example, had a fondness for him, despite for their time being champions of anti-racism and anti-imperialism.

Perhaps, just as we have no difficulty in glossing over the embarrassing juvenilia of a writer, we should, as you say, also extend that largesse to those brought up in 'juvenile' eras when it was easier (though not inevitable) to be sucked up into the thoughtcrimes of jingoism and white supremacy.

And his name has always struck me as so touching. I wonder if the Beckhams were thinking of him when they named Brooklyn.

Kipling sneaks through the Pearly Gates on my watch, albeit with a spot of finger-wagging.