Rudyard Kipling is best known for writing Gunga Din, The Jungle Book and The Man Who Would Be King. The Light That Failed is another enduring classic written in 1890. It was adapted into stage and radio plays and a hit film starring Ronald Coleman in 1939. It tells the story of Dick Heldar, a painter who goes blind. Most synopsis have Dick trying to become a famous painter to win the heart of his childhood sweetheart Maisie. Sounds romantic, but it's not the novel Kipling wrote.
Dick and Maisie grew up in the same care home, and pledge to always be friends. In his youth Dick goes to war, sketching scenes around him as they travel up the Nile to Khartoum. He befriends a war correspondent who sends the sketches to London, and when Dick returns home, he's surprised to find he is a sought-after artist. Enjoying his new found money, he shares rooms with his wartime friends and squanders his talent. One day he happens to meet Maisie again, independent and also an artist. A lot of time is spent with Dick judging her work and talking about art. Suddenly, Dick goes blind. In his frustration, he reaches out to Maisie, who leaves him thinking he has gone mad. His friends go off to another war - left alone, he's taken advantage of and left unclean and malnourished. In an attempt to return to life, he embarks on a perilous journey - by train, car, boat, horse - to join his friends at the front in Sudan.
I was lucky to find a nice Triangle Books hardcover with a dustjacket that states it's 'his most famous novel - the haunting love story'. There is a friendship with Maisie, but he annoys her by criticizing her art, at one point offering to paint a picture she could sign, as he is far more accomplished. A romance never really happens, and any build up abruptly ends halfway through the novel with the simple line "and that is the end of Maisie". He wastes his time and money before trying for a last great masterpiece as blindness sets in. In 1890, he could be seen as a romantic figure by swooning girls, but he is too self centred to be endearing. Various incarnations over the years may alter the story for effect, and it's possible that charming Ronald Colman dispels any doubt Dick is a romantic hero. Recommended for lovers of classic novel and adventure - hard to believe it was written 127 years ago!
1890 / Hardcover / 355 pages
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