“IF” - Rudyard Kipling

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!

1. The text

Kipling, an English short-story writer, novelist and poet, wrote the poem “If” for his son to tell him how to become a decent human being. The poem, intense and pressing, is composed of 32 verses. The genre of poetry is pedagogical-formative but also of warning to the child. However, this poem is also able to give a sincere and warm paternal feeling. It’s a letter that contains a set of precepts and instructions on how to behave or, better, explains that the one who is able to follow these behaviors is really worthy of being called Man.

2. The message

In the verses of this poem are contained the essential qualities that each of us should cultivate and develop to be a better person and serenely walk the path of their lives. According to Kipling, the qualities that man must cultivate are control, self-confidence, patience, calm. Moreover, the individual must not deprive himself of the dream that is the salt of life, the ambition to achieve higher goals even in the awareness and acceptance of defeat. One falls continually, but the virtue of man consists in the ability to know how to get up and "start again from the beginning". Life is an inverted hourglass, so it is extremely important to attribute great value to time and be careful not to waste even a minute. Man is not born to live alone, but it is opportune to keep in good consideration the people who meet along the way.

3. Considerations and reflections

This is a poem that manages to express, with very simple words, very important concepts, a poem that the author has written for his son and that therefore contains all the love and care of a father for his creature.
"If" is one of those poems that is always current despite the passing years, an ageless poem, originally written for a child but that also significantly affects the hearts of adults, a poem that offers a thousand ideas to improve every day. It is a wonderful hymn to life, which Kipling dedicates to his son, where to make a child a man are dreams, values, freedom and the will to consider every step of our existence as a path to something new. It is a wonderful reflection in verse, addressed to everyone, who teaches us to become Men from "sons".

I think this is a very beautiful poem because it wants us to reflect on the meaning of life and of being men. My favourite phrase is “if you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, but make allowance for their doubting too”. This phrase means “one must be self-confident but in the same time not arrogant. I’m not very self-confident and I believe that I must learn to trust my potential and don’t be influenced by the others ideas but don’t be arrogant with others.

4. Conclusions

Educating a child to become a man: this is the primary task of a father. But what does it mean to be a man? How to face the difficult job of living well, without being selfish and overbearing, but in turn without being crushed? For Rudyard Kipling the password for access from childhood to adulthood is the word "if". According to me, Kipling has chosen to write a poem and not a narrative text because with the verses we get straight to the heart of a child. And since the purpose of this writing is also educational and the author wants to explain to his son in a simple and schematic way the behaviors to be held and the way forward to become real men, this is the most suitable form because the effect is immediate.