Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English journalist, short-story writer, poet, and novelist. He was born in India, which inspired much of his work.
In 1889, Kipling left India for his American travels. In New York he met Mark Twain in a two-hour conversation on trends in Anglo-American literature and was deeply impressed.
Kipling's works of fiction include The Jungle Book (1894), Kim (1901), and many short stories, like "The Man Who Would Be King" (1888), as well as the novel Captains Courageous. He published two connected poetry and story collections: Puck of Pook's Hill (1906), and Rewards and Fairies (1910).
Kipling is regarded as a major innovator in the art of the short story; his children's books are classics of children's literature, and one critic described his work as exhibiting "a versatile and luminous narrative gift".
(source: wikipedia)