It has become emblematic of the Victorian idea of the “stiff upper lip.”. More About The Poem "If" and Rudyard Kipling Were you to write the biography of Rudyard Kipling as a graph, the first thing that would strike you would be the steep vertical zigzags. Perhaps Kipling’s most famous poem, “If” urges superhuman stoicism in the face of life’s disasters. Rudyard Kipling - 1865-1936 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,

The chart would have to start on a high point: his birth in India to a loving set of parents. Although he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1907, his political views, which grew more toxic as he aged, have long made him critically unpopular. Rudyard Kipling is one of the best-known of the late Victorian poets and story-tellers. Rudyard Kipling's 'IF', instills a sense of positive forthcoming, the likes of which poetry like this, generally does - what sets this apart, however, is that within these verses, Kipling spells out the requisites for a virtuous existence, trimming the fat off it, and concisely putting it on a platter.