Best poem of all, recited to me by my mother, when I was having so many problems...... Thank you mom, this is the best poem I ever heard. I gave that to my son too, when he felt the same. What a gifft. Thank you Rudyard Kipling. That lesson, that poem, that spirit..... was such a blessing. Even to this day.
@@dandong8351 thanks, man..... great lessons there. Old poems are such underrated treasures. Robert service also great and fun and thoughtful, like iceworm cocktail and cremation of sam mcgee... but also all the war poems. I wish ya well sir.
My Grandmother used to read me Kipling. I know his books and poems are full of stuff that is considered objectionable today, but we shouldn't toss out the baby with the bathwater. There's a lot of wit and strength in there.
I have lived this. After my Dad passed, I stood alone, facing formidable foes, I doubted myself, I had to dig deep to conquer these evil forces. I won. I discovered this wise poem, years later.
My father just passed recently and I'm in a similar situation: surrounded on all sides by problems. Stories like yours give me hope at this time. I hope that you are in a better place now, and that in years time I will be too.
A poem written for a thirteen year old son, who’d die in world war 1… the last few lines … “fill the unforgiving minute with 60 seconds worth of distance run. Yours will be the earth and all that’s in it. What’s more my son - you’ll be a man. “ This really resonates with me …
I found copies and copies of this poem in my father's military footlocker. A sharecropper son , mother died in the greenville flood , under the ocean in the Pacific during ww2 at the age of 16 . I think this was my father's education. What a good thing .
This poem is the perfect advice for life ! It has helped me get through some of my worst and most difficult times ! GOD Bless Rudyard Kipling ! And GOD Bless Dennis Hopper !
Amazing to watch a 'cowboy" recite poetry on the Johny and Cash Show They need to bring this idea back for todays audience. I watched a short item on tv earlier today Justin Beiber in his underwear Riveting!!! The world has become brain dead.
The greatest recitation of this poem I've ever heard,,,, the Michael Caine version is lovely but this is just perfect. This poem had meant so much to so many men and women over the years,,, it's wonderful to see it still rings as true today as it ever did. I would love to hear Owen Wilson recite this.
Jocko and Spokenverse both do a great job too. Caine and Hopper actually both make mistakes. They aren't meaningful, but I've memorized the poem so they stand out.
@@kungfoochicken08 Yeah they did,, especially Michael Caine,,, but the message is so powerful,, most would say it's wasted on the last coupla generations,, but I'm not sure about that.
When I hear him recite the "risk it all" line, I can't but think of "The Lost Movie" and how he truly hit rock bottom, then started over again, kept at it. A deeply troubled guy who achieved some amazing things.
@@elisgerdt8928 A typo that speaks to how the film was out of circulation for many years! I'm not sure I'm with you on "greatest," however... Hopper famously screened it for Jodorowsky, who pointed out its unconscious colonialism, much to Hopper's horror.
@@TheCropCircleQueens He must be an impatient man, & is always tired of waiting, so he deliberately missed the line, as for him the poem works best without it, & is more honest.
This poem from over a century ago is a direct response to modern 21st Century victimhood culture which is both arrogant, conceited and soul crushing in the guise of compassion. "IF" is Victorian stoicism better known as the "stiff upper lip". It basically says don't take bad things too hard or take good things for granted. Everybody experiences devastating set backs but men have the duty not to complain about it for even a moment and be resilient and determined enough to start over again. Doing so will be it's own great reward.
It's about where one finds their sense of self. Either you find it within where it is eternal and immutable, or you depend externally on people, circumstances, relationships for your sense of self where you will be tossed around and crushed.
It's one I quote from regularly ( I'm in the security industry in the UK) my dad was in the British Army for 20 years ,,, this poem is about being a man I think Dennis Nailed it
just sublime-best version i ever heard.my father < doug-read this to me when i was 8> And then i spent 20 years hating him-till he died. I I kissed his cold shell-never having made up-he was alone on his double bed. only yesterday i heard these words and remembered him reading them to me.....im not yet a man my dad>
My favorite Poem in prep school (prep 1, I believe). And Ironically when I came back to America for highschool I had to analyse this poem on the IB English finals for secondary school (highschool) ha!
lOVE HIS RECITATION- possibly my favourite. And what a great recovery at the beginning, where he left out the 5th line; "If you can wait and not be tired by waiting". (this threw the rhyme scheme out, but as a great professional he carried on). His conversationalist and big-brother tone is unique.
Well Done! One of the best Rudyard Kipling poems written around 1895. It was a man's world at this time, but this poem applies to both men and women in that when you are able to emobody the virtues and challenges in this poem, you have become an person of honour and maturity. Many of the ideals in this poem are not modern ideals but should be read more often to temper our current society's ideals.
If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise: If you can dream-and not make dreams your master; If you can think-and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools: If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’ If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings-nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And-which is more-you’ll be a Man, my son!
