Rudyard Kipling's book Stalky & Co. is about young men attending a British boarding school. Three young main characters in this collection of school stories have a smug, cynical attitude toward authority and patriotism. After the stories were featured in periodicals for the preceding two years, it was first published in 1899. Part I of ""Slaves of the Lamp."" Mr. King interrupts the three boys while they are practicing a pantomime of ""Aladdin"" because he has discovered jokes Beetle wrote about him. When the younger child who taught King the poems is there, he drags Beetle into his study and corrects him. Stalky gets an intoxicated carter to throw stones at King by shooting him with a catapult. In ""An Unsavoury Interlude,"" Mr. King makes fun of Beetle for once being frightened to take a bath in the ocean, which causes the boys from Mr. King's house to call the boys from Mr. Prout's house ""stinkers.""Many lads take part eagerly in order to train for their future professions as military officers. But when a member of parliament is asked to speak at the school on ""patriotism,"" he angers the lads by raising the Union Jack. The cadet corps left the next morning under Stalky's leadership. The majority of Kipling's characters, who are now about thirty, are soldiers or civil officials in India.

Kipling portrays school as the first stage of a much larger game, a pattern-maker for the experiences of life. Implied throughout the stories is the question 'What happened to these fifteen-year-old boys, and how did the lessons they learned at school apply to the world of warfare and imperial government?' The stories are based on Kipling's own school, the United Services College at Westward Ho! in Devon, which prepared boys destined for the army or for colonial service; Kipling himself appears as the subordinate character, Beetle. This edition includes five Stalky stories which did not appear in the original volume, and thus constitutes a Complete Stalky & Co. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Stalky, M'Turk and the Beetle are the trio who conduct a battle of wits with masters and school fellows alike in these tales of school life.

Limits and Renewals, Kipling's last collection of short stories, was written shortly after the death of his only son. Dark and penetrating in tone, these are brilliant portraits of a soul in torment with some welcome relief coming in the tales of 'Aunt Ellen' and 'The Miracle of Saint Jubanus'.

Contains a selection of Kipling's short stories.