The Man Who Would Be King

Daniel Dravot is a fictional character in Rudyard Kipling's short story The Man Who Would Be King, subsequently made into a feature film in 1975. In... the film, he is portrayed by Sean Connery. In the short story, Dravot and co-conspirator Peachey Carnehan are members of the Third Degree of Freemasonry. Travelling to Kafiristan with the intention of becoming kings, the two make a very convenient discovery: the natives are in possession of the secrets of both the First and Second Degrees of Freemasonry, but not those of the Third Degree. Dravot puts on his Master Mason's apron, whereupon the natives recognise the Third Degree symbol as their own sacred symbol concealed on the bottom of a stone. As luck would have it, the stone on which the symbol is engraved is the very stone upon which Dravot is then sitting. Dravot immediately declares himself "Grand Master of All Kafiristan" and also Co-King of Kafiristan along with Peachey. The conspiracy is eventually discovered, and results in the death of Dravot. Peachey is crucified between two trees, and survives for a day. The natives see this, and let him go.
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Release date:December 17, 1975

Directed by:John Huston

Rated:

Runtime:129 minutes

The Man Who Would Be King is a 1975 film adapted from the Rudyard Kipling short story of the same title. It was adapted and directed by John Huston and starred Sean Connery, Michael Caine, Saeed Jaffrey, and Christopher Plummer as Kipling . The film follows two rogue ex-non-commissioned officers of... the Indian Army who set off from late 19th century British India in search of adventure and end up as kings of Kafiristan. Kipling is believed to have been inspired by the travels of American adventurer Josiah Harlan during the period of the Great Game between Imperial Russia and the British Empire and James Brooke, an Englishman who became the "white Raja" of Sarawak in Borneo. Like much of his writing, Kipling's original story takes a nuanced view of imperialism; in Huston's telling, both East and West have their faults and virtues. While working as a correspondent at the offices of the Northern Star newspaper, Kipling is approached by a ragged, seemingly crazed derelict, who reveals himself to be his old acquaintance Peachy Carnehan .
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The adventure novel is a genre of novels that has adventure, an exciting undertaking involving risk and physical danger, as its main storyline.... Critic Don D'Ammassa, in the Introduction to the Encyclopedia of Adventure Fiction defines the genre by stating that "an adventure is an event or series of events that happens outside the course of the protagonist's ordinary life, usually accompanied by danger, often by physical action. Adventure stories almost always move quickly, and the pace of the plot is at least as important as characterization, setting and other elements of a creative work." D'Ammassa argues that adventure novels make the element of danger the focus of their story; hence he argues that Charles Dickens' novel A Tale of Two Cities is an adventure novel because the protagonists are in constant danger of being imprisoned or killed, whereas Dickens' Great Expectations is not because "Pip's encounter with the convict is an adventure, but that scene is only a device to advance the main plot, which is not truly an adventure." Adventure has been a common theme since the earliest days of written fiction.
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