Reflecting on 'If'

Posted 6/19/2019

This address is inspired by Reverend Holland’s reflection on Saturday about Father’s Day and some recent events both on and off campus – from sports tournaments to exam season, from the Inter-house tug-of-war to prize and prefect selection, from our inaugural Pride Day to the community’s response to the loss of one of us. I asked Maria G., Ciaran B., Paige D., and Jojo T. to read the poem If as a prelude to my reflection this morning.

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 those 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 [those] 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!

Many of you will know Rudyard Kipling as the writer of ‘The Jungle Book’ and creator of Shere Khan the tiger, Baloo the bear, and the boy-cub Mowgli.

He is connected with our world at Shawnigan as he visited British Columbia three times in and around the turn of the twentieth century including honeymooning on the island. He even gave a poetry reading in Duncan.

His poem If remains a touchstone for many. It continues to claim its spot in the patriotic Hall of Fame alongside hymns we sing here in Chapel, including Jerusalem and I Vow to thee my Country.

Some of you will have recognized the poem read by the four prefects – first published in 1910, three years after Kipling was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature

Kipling’s inspiration for this poem came from the wonderfully named Leander Starr Jameson and his infamous leadership in a failed military raid in southern Africa, which led to the second Anglo-Boer war. Kipling took the story of unheroic failure and turned it into a poem of advice to his young son, John.

These four prefects were involved in last month’s sports championships and will have, therefore, recently experienced the highs and lows of sporting endeavour, the nerves, the superstitions, the team dynamic, the inches and seconds that divide failure and success, the disappointment, the delight, and the importance of picking oneself and those around you up when all is done.

Lines from the poem appear over the tennis players’ entrance to Wimbledon's Centre Court:

"If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster / and treat those two impostors just the same"

There have undoubtedly been moments of individual and collective ‘triumph’ and ‘disaster’ – from moments of elation to the agony of falling just short, from the joy of teamwork to moments of individual ill-discipline.

And how challenging it is to "treat those two imposters just the same" – humble in victory and magnanimous in defeat.

We have all stumbled in pursuit of success.

I remember quite vividly – and with some shame - playing in a six-a-side Inter-house field hockey match as captain of our team. It was the final and we were the dominant side in the tournament of 12 teams. In the first few minutes, my roommate, Gogi (a talented sportsman from the Punjab in India), inexplicably decided to cross the ball across our defence. We were playing on grass in those days, the ball was intercepted, and the opposition scored.

Furious, I released a tirade of abuse against my team and roommate with an expletive thrown in for emphasis and good measure. The umpire (now the Headmaster of King’s School Canterbury in England), unwittingly and disastrously, walked between the two of us and thought I was swearing at him for his umpiring skills. I was promptly sent off for the whole match and we lost. It was a lonely walk back to the house – and a lonely couple of days as my lack of self-discipline had cost the House a treasured trophy.

It still haunts me a little, thirty years on.

The poem If is inspirational, motivational, speaks to self-discipline, and provides a blueprint for personal integrity, a code of conduct, and self-development.

It contains not simply a message for sport but for all that we, as staff and students, do daily as we seek to live our lives by the values of Shawnigan.

It gives us guidance as to how to react to academic achievement and disappointment, to our day-to-day ambitions, and most of all, serves as guidance for us to be the best version of ourselves.

This poem has a special significance for me. My father is a surgeon and my mother a nurse. Over time, they taught their two sons the significance in their professional lives of that line from the last stanza of the poem: "walk with kings – nor lose the common touch."

A hospital is made of many people – and how critical it is for a surgeon and nurse to appreciate, support, and connect with patients, families, fellow doctors and nurses, receptionists, porters, the kitchen and cleaning teams, and many others.

I see many parallels with my own job now within a school and campus context.

There is a lesson in there for all of us – not to lose the ‘common touch.’

Of course, it feels a little dated and very much a poem of its time – a paternal set of advice to a young son. Kipling cuts a controversial figure these days. In many ways, he is a representative of British imperialism at its best and worst, with his poetry eagerly and overly patriotic.

The sad part of this story is that Kipling’s son, John, the implied listener in this poem, was killed five years after his father wrote the poem, aged 18, at the Battle of Loos in 1915.

The poem continues to resonate – and I hope that there is a line or two in there that each of you can apply to the term gone by.

I remember being quite inspired when it was used for the highlights of the 1998 FIFA World Cup – the BBC set the highlights of the tournament to a reading of the poem with the musical score of Faure’s Pavane.

Look it up on YouTube: you will recognise the young David Beckham receiving a red card for a reckless reaction to a foul, the original gap-toothed Brazilian Ronaldo, and Zinedine Zidane as a player and winner of the World Cup. It captures cynical fouls, professional dives, missed penalties – all of the triumphs and disasters of the tournament.

In 2017, as part of her contribution to International Women’s Day, Serena Williams (the former tennis No. 1) captured the spirit of the day by reciting the poem – turning and broadening it into an ode to women with the final line: "Which is more… you will be a woman, sister."

Ms. Conroy sent me a sporting advertisement released earlier this term with the tag line: #ChangetheGame – with a unique take and re-imagining of Kipling’s poem with a powerful video and message for the modern day sportswomen.

Finally, think about the lines in the poem that resonate with you and capture your endeavour this term, this year, in every facet of our lives here:

I hope that, as students and staff, we can reflect on the year gone by at Shawnigan and can be proud that we have filled "the unforgiving minute / With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run."

Richard D A Lamont

Headmaster

18th June 2019

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