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Formative influences in the life of Olive Schreiner, Victorian feminist and freethinkier

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Formative influences in the life of Olive Schreiner, Victorian feminist and freethinkier

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FORMATIVE INFLUENCES IN THE LIFE OF OLIVE SCHREINER,
VICTORIAN FEMINIST AND FREETHINKER
by
Yaffa Draznin
A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER CF ARTS
(History)
May 1982
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
TH E G R A D U A T E S C H O O L
U N IV E R S IT Y PARK
LOG A N G E L E S . C A L IF O R N IA S 0 0 0 7
This thesis, w ritten by
. Y5. ff a . . J3 ra2nin......................
under the direction o f k£X..„Thesis Com m ittee,
and approved by a ll its members, has been p re
sented to and accepted by the D ean o f T h e
Graduate School, in p a rtia l fu lfillm en t o f the
requirements fo r the degree of
i n History............
Dean
T H T T S T K m A / T A / T l T 'T F T T .
Chairman
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF FIGURES........................................ ill
CHAPTER
I Introduction ................................ 1
II A Brief Biography of Olive Schreiner . . . 7
III Religious and Missionary Influences .... 19
IV Social and Sexual Roles on the South
African Karoo............................ 27
V Books and Formative Ideas ............... 37
................................. 47
................................. 52
................................. 55
................................. 58
62
................................. 65
................................. 67
BIBLIOGRAPHY ...................................... 68
VI Conclusion
Notes to Chapter I
Notes to Chapter II
Notes to Chapter III
Notes to Chapter IV
Notes to Chapter V
Notes to Chapter VI
ii
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1 An Olive Schreiner Itinerary,
1855-1881 ........................ 15
Figure 2 The Cape as it was during
Olive Schreiner's youth ................ 18
CHAPTER I
Introduction
When the South-African born author, Olive Schreiner,
died in a suburb of Cape Town in 1920, her place among
literary greats of Great Britain and as a forerunner of the
emerging women's movement was unquestioned. W. E. Lechy,
■the historian, proclaimed her 188 3 novel, The Story of an
! 1
. African Farm, an eloquent feminist and freethinker's
! ,i2
■testament, "among the best novels in the English language.
Sir Charles Dilke, undersecretary of foreign affairs under
'william Gladstone, saw it as "the only great literary work
j * [
which has proceeded from the Cape . . . [and] one of the ■
I ♦
I 3
greatest efforts in all the field of literature ..."
i t
jThe Reverend Canon'Malcolm MacColl, was so taken by the
.book recommended to -him by Gladstone that he organized a
■luncheon with the Prime Minister and the author in order to
i
■discuss it further. H. W. Massingham, editor of one of
Britain's foremost opinion journals, The Nation, was
'ecstatic in his praise. "Olive Schreiner," he wrote, "was j
i
not only the greatest woman of her time; she was one of
i
;the chief glories of English literature. The Story of an \
African Farm . . . is the most thrilling story of the !
spiritual or the emotional iife ever told by a woman."^ :
Yet despite these glowing testimonials, this seminal
figure has disappeared from the literary and feminist canon
within the short span of three generations. This eclipse
is as unfortunate as it is undeserved, for Olive Schreiner
was a woman clearly one hundred years before her time.
In both her fiction and nonfiction, Olive Schreiner
concerned herself with problems that are of major concern
to women today. Her plea for women’s rights was not
< limited to the Edwardian suffragette platform, nor for
jbetter working conditions for lower-class women as the
I
;late-Victorian social reformers espoused. She appealed
|
for equality of professional job opportunities, for the
need for self-respect, and for the right of women to make
jtheir own sexual decisions, clearly a modern platform
relevant to middle-class women of the 20th century.
| At the same time, despite views that were avant-garde
by. any measure used in late-Victorian society, she had
I
Igreat popular appeal in her own day. Thousands of her
contemporaries read African Farm. The book went into three
editions in 1883 and twelve more over the next forty
g
years; it was translated into French, German, Dutch,
: 7
Czeckoslovakian, and Esperanto. In America, where a lack
i
of a copyright law permitted its unauthorized publication,
.it was even more popular; Olive Schreiner estimated that
8
V'lOO copies [were being sold] to one sold in England."
i
I
I
To understand the depth of Schreiner's appeal, one *
must explore her early life, those first twenty-five years
spent in South Africa, from 18 55 to 1881, to discover how
she developed the views she* expressed so clearly. By
(Studying the sources of her creativity, one may find the
jclue to both her prescience in anticipating 20th century
jsentiments and her talent in finding common ground with a
broad segment of late-Victorian society.
I
| Sources i
I *
j Primary manuscript sources for the first.twenty-five j
f J
. a i
^years of Olive Schreiner's life are scarce, but published j
ones do exist in greater number. i
i 1
Only one portion of Olive Schreiner's original journal,'
.written at the Ratel Hoek farm from 1876 through 1878,
^exists in manuscript form, located in the Humanities
|Research Center, University of Texas in Austin. Other j
■portions of her journals were published as part of The Life j
j ' i
of Olive Schreiner, written by her husband, Samuel Cron i
Cronwright Schreiner, shortly after her death. The journal j
originals were destroyed by Cronwright after the book was
written.®
' I
Correspondence from this period, both manuscripts and j
f
published sources, is as follows:
(1) letters about or by Olive, published in
i
J
, Cronwright*s Life of Olive Schreiner
(eleven in all), reproduced either in I
full or in part);^0
(2) correspondence of Olive Schreiner,
selected and edited by her husband and
published shortly after her death as
The Letters of Olive Schreiner, twenty-
one of which fall into this pre-London
11
time;
i
i (3) a collection of published letters to and
\
j by Kate Schreiner Findlay, Olive's oldest j
i ' I
! sister, as The Findlay Letters, some of |
which relate directly to Olive and others !
which throw light on the relationship be- |
1 !
' tween the Schreiner parents and their j
children; and j
(4) precis of unpublished Findlay correspondence, !
' collected, by Kate Findlay's grandson and
I 1
now housed in the Department of Historical
i j
Papers, University of the Witwatersrand
12
library, Johannesburg. ;
i Because Cronwright's biography of his wife contains j
I
I
letters and journal entries no longer extant in manuscript
form, as well as accounts of conversations he had with his j
:wife recorded nowhere, else, this work is regarded as a
"primary source. With two exceptions, all other biographies |
I IU / •
of Olive Schreiner, eight in all, were-regarded as secondary
I 13
sources. They either are based largely on the Cronwright
version or are too poorly documented to justify the
^acceptance of any alteration in the facts given in the
Jcronwright-Schreiner biography.
i ' The 1948 biography of Schreiner by Vera Buchanan-Gould
|
'is one of the exceptions noted above, As the published
■version of the author's Ph.D. dissertation, written during
that year at the University of Cape Town, it contains
; extensive interviews and information from unpublished
j
'material which Olive's husband did not use. Unfortunately,
the publication available outside of South Africa appears
to have had many of the footnotes deleted. Although some !
facts were cited, others were not; therefore not many of
the items which differed from those in Conwright-Schreiner's'
!
. Life could be authenticated. Buchanan-Gould discovered an j
unpublished letter to Kate Schreiner Findlay in which Olive
| 14 i
mentions being engaged to a Mr. Julius Gau, but evidence j
' 15 >
of this was withheld by Cronwright-Schreiner. ;
: i
i The other biography of note by First and Scott has a !
i
partisan point of view but is profusely documented. !
Unfortunately, most of its documentation covers the later j
period of Schreiner's life; for the most part, facts per- j
; I
taining to Olive Schreiner's early years conform to the j
i
Life version, with the Buchanan-Gould addendum. Their j
■original research in the records of the missionary
(societies in Basel and London disclosed heretofore unknown
facts about the Schreiner parents, pertaining to their
early lives and their relationship to the missionary work.
A fruitful source of autobiographical data comes
directly from Olive Schreiner herself, as part of the two
I
jnovels she completed in South Africa before leaving for
•London: Undine and African Farm. Besides the clearly
jautobiographical portions, a number of characters and
jepisodes have autobiographical overtones; inferences drawn
\
from these can be shown to have sound foundation.
i . . .
' Background source material about the Victorian period
jis cited as appears relevant.
CHAPTER II
A Brief Biography of Olive Schreiner
Olive Emilie Albertina Schreiner was born in 18 55, on
ithe Wittenbergen Missionary Station,^" in what is now
Lesotho, Republic of South Africa. Her parents, the
Reverend Gottlob Schreiner and his wife, Rebecca, came to
lAfrica in 1837 with the London Missionary Society (LMS);
I ]
jnine years before Olive was born, he left the IMS and ;
i ■ '
. ’ transferred his affiliation to the Wesleyan Missionary ■
!o ■ 4 - 2
jSociety. •
| i
The family was a large one, twelve children in all.
| I
;0f the seven who reached adulthood, five (Catherine,
.Frederick, Theophilus, Alice, and Henrietta) were from
seventeen to five years older than Olive; William Philip i
i
! 3 i
was years younger. Five children did not survive j
childhood. Olive was named after the three boys, Oliver, !
1 x !
* 4 I
:Emile, and Albert, who died before she was born. !
i . !
The first twenty-five years of Olive Schreiner’s life •
t
were spent in the country, most of it on the vast, dry
i ;
^plains of South Africa known as the karoo. Figuratively,
r \ \
jas well as literally, it is
! j
: a land of great horizons, flat-topped
| distant blue hills, sunsets of unparalleled
i magnificence and magically evocative f
< solitude. Farmsteads lie far out of
i sight one from another. . . . It is a
country whose austerity, as likely as
not, repels the passing stranger but
commands the passionate devotion of
those whose roots are there.5
When Olive was ten, her father was dismissed by the
Wesleyans for violating a basic proscription against trading
with the natives. Onable to practice his ministry, Gottlob
.Schreiner worked at various jobs: as a general dealer and
i
shopkeeper, then as a middleman, and finally as a peddler
j
and sometimes tutor. He was unsuccessful at them all.
; i
After he died in 187 6, his wife became a Roman Catholic and ;
i
;made her home at a convent in Grahamstown.
I
I
Olive was a precocious child and, by all accounts, a |
i ;
I
very attractive one: \
small and slight with a lovely smooth ■
skin, bright colour, large soft dark
eyes, beautiful eyes; masses of soft
brown hair, the color of her eyes, very j
clever and bright . . .® ;
j Gottlob Schreiner's break with the Wesleyans broke up j
j
.the family as -well. From age twelve on, when her parents
i
.became too poor to keep the children at home, Olive was
sent to live in turn with her brother Theo and sister Hetty ;
in Cradock, with in-laws of sister Alice in Burgensdorp,
then with various cousins and aunts, then with a minister !
friend of the family in Dordrecht. In 187 2 she moved back
with her parents for a short while but left soon after to ;
join Theo and Hetty in New Rush (Kimberly); then it was |
back to Alice again in Frazerburg and on to Cape Town, to j
i
i
8;
stay with other relatives of Alice.
It was a peripatetic, unfocused adolescence in which
she was always dependent upon others, forced to make her
home with whomever offered her one. Sometime during this
7
period, she had her first attack of asthma, and the
attacks became increasingly severe as she entered into her
(twenties.
In 1874, when she was nineteen, Olive Schreiner took a
job as a governess with the family of a Mr. George Weakley,
|a storekeeper and editor in Colesberg. She stayed there
i
for a year. In succession, thereafter, she was governess
jwith the Stoffel Fouche family at Klein Ganna Hoek, nine- j
! |
iteen kilometers south of Cradock; with the Reverend Martin
jfamily at Ratel Hoek, on the Tarka river thirty-seven
^kilometers from Karkastan; with the Cawoods at Ganna Hoek
| (the farm adjoining the one on which the Fouches had lived);
i
land back to the Fouches, now living at Lelie Kloof, between
i
iCradock and Bedford.
i
! Olive began to write down the stories she had been
|talking aloud while staying with Hetty and Theo at Kimberly j
and started work on Undine, her first novel; she was then j
— [
eighteen. She 'began African Farm while living with the !
Martins at Ratel Hoek and finished it in 187 9 while working j
for the Africaans-speaking Fouches at Leslie Kloof. At |
Leslie Kloof, she also was writing another novel, eventually
* 7 \
to be named From Man to Man. ?
In 1881, at age twenty-six, with 2h completed novels
in her portmanteau, Olive Schreiner took the mail packet,
Kinfaulen Castle, to England. Although she carried her
unpublished novels with her, her intention at the time was
to pursue a medical career, not a literary one. For the
next’two years, she tried to become, first, a nurse, then
a doctor; but her medical aspirations were eventually
^thwarted for a number of reasons. A major one was the
^increased severity of her asthma attacks. She then :
| ‘
acquiesed to the urgings of her brothers Fred and Will j
i . I
; (both in England at the time) and sought to find a publisher,
i !
j
■for African Farm. The fourth publisher she contacted, j
;Chapman and Hall, accepted it; it came out in two volumes t
:in 1883 under the pseudonym of Ralph Iron.
j Within a year, the book was a popular success, both
\
!in England and in America. Greatly encouraged, Olive
j
j 1
turned to writing full-time, expecting to finish From Man j
I j
i to Man by the end of 1884. She did not. In the next six j
iyears, spent in London, the English country- and seaside, I
and at various spas and health resorts on the Continent,
although writing constantly, her literary output was meager:
she finished only twelve short stories and allegories <
during the entire period.
The period, however, was fruitful in another sense.
Embraced as the darling of an avant-garde social set, she
! was introduced to such well-known literary figures as (
George Moore, George Meredith (who as reader for Chapman J
and Hall recommended the publication of African Farm),
Arthur Symons, W. T. Stead, Philip Marsden, H. Rider
Haggard, Herbert Spencer, and George Bernard Shaw. During
•this' period she had an intense but generally unsatisfying
love affair with Havelock Ellis (which eventually settled
down to a lifelong friendship), and another, even more
intense and less satisfactory, with the mathmetician and
' 10 ■
ibiostatistician, Karl Pearson. Her closest friends
i
-during these London years were Eleanor Marx, Karl Marx's
1
'daughter; Dr. Bryan Donkin, the Marx' family physician;
i i
'
|and Edward Carpenter, author and early British champion of j
i !
Walt Whitman.
* |
I Despite their stimulation, those years in England |
were times of great turbulence and trauma for Olive
I
|Schreiner. Her writing was going badly. Her asthma turned
i
jinto a permanently crippling disability. In desperation,
|she returned to South Africa in 1889. At age thirty-four,
still unmarried and very ill, she was convinced of her
'failure as a writer. * j
< But the success of African Farm in England was repli-
i
cated in South Africa. With mixed feelings, Olive found
! |
herself acclaimed as the outstanding colonial writer of the 1
19th century. A new phase of her life began.
Always intensely interested in South African politics, :
she immersed herself in the activities of the Cape colony,
her illness notwithstanding. Through her brother Will, now
a Cape province MP (later to become Attorney General in
Rhodes' cabinet and eventually colony Prime Minister in his
■own right), she met Cecil Rhodes, whom she initially admired
jwithout reservation. Gradually, however, her feelings
toward Rhodes slipped from admiration to disappointment,
| !
jto unhappiness, finally to hostility as she progressively
(disapproved of his anti-black, anti-Boer, "imperialist"
i
stance. Late in 1892, she met and was attracted to a local
i i
i |
Cradock farmer, Samuel Cronwright, a man eight years her :
; i
ijunior, who expressed similar anti-Rhodes antipathy. In
February, 1894, after some indecision on Olive's part, they
J
jwere married. In deference to her celebrity, he agreed to
! 11
:take her last name as his own.
!
! Olive and Cronwright had one child, born in 18 94; but
i
^the baby lived only eighteen hours. This was their only
' . 12
issue, although Olive had several subsequent miscarriages. ;
: Both Olive and Cronwright Schreiner were ardent
supporters of the Boers and the Boer cause in South Africa.
t '
They strongly condemned the English intrusion into Boer
(territory in the Jameson Raid; and as war appeared imminent,|
Olive Schreiner turned more and more to writing articles,
speeches, and pamphlets in support of her anti-Rhodes, pro- ;
;Boer convictions. In 1896 she turned back momentarily to
i
I
the fiction genre to write a thinly veiled polemic against
Cecil Rhodes and the Chartered Companies. With Trooper
Peter Halket of Mashonaland, her break with Rhodes was
complete.
When the Anglo-Boer war broke out in 1899, Cronwright
left on a speaking tour in England to campaign against the
war, while Olive roamed the country to find a place where
she could breathe. She was staying temporarily in the
f karoo town of Hanover when the British declared martial law
in 1900. There she was interned for the duration, at times
kept to limited house arrest; and when her husband finally
came to be with her, he too was detained. When the war
I ended, after a series of moves to find a place where Olive’s
I • ;
i asthma was least troublesome, they settled at De Aar. i
During all this time, Olive continued to speak and !
! work, as best she could, for the cause of women's rights
and electoral suffrage. In 1911, she published her second
i
■ major work, an extended treatise on the position of women
in society, called Woman and Labour; it was a rewritten
1
portion of a much larger manuscript left in their Johannes-j
I
burg home before the war and burned by the occupying !
13 ^
; British troops. In this book, Schreiner gave historical |
| and philosophic underpinning to the views expressed in j
African Farm, with her reasoned arguments regarding the
deleterious effects of the exclusion of women from the
13J
productive work force, not only upon women but on men as
well. Coinciding with the rising feminist sentiment of the
pre-World War I period. Woman and Labour became the "Bible"
for the active suffragette movement;^ just recently it has
been absorbed into the canon of landmark feminist litera
ture.
But bad health continued as a black motif in
Schreiner's life. In 1913, despearte for some relief, she
left South Africa for the health spas of Europe, reaching
| Bad Nauheim, Germany on the eve of World War I. She
escaped to England on the last train out of the country.
Olive remained in England throughout the war and for
two years beyond, shunned by almost all of her old friends
and former supporters because of the absolutist pacifist
! position she had by then assumed. She became a virtual
i
jrecluse, aged and permanently deformed.
; In 1920, her husband finally came to London to join
I
I
jher; but six weeks later, unable to face another winter in
1
: England, she left for home without him. She died in a
t
; boarding house in Cape Town on December 11, 1920, age
j
; sixty-five.
14
j Year
| 1855
t
I 1861
i
| 1865
i
j
i
!
1867
i
i
|
1 1871
Place
Figure 1*
An Olive Schreiner Itinerary, 18 55-1881
_______ Month/Day Event
Wittenbergen Mis
sion Station
Healdtown
Balfour
Cradock
Avoca
Hermon
Aliwal North
Dordrecht
March 24
February
August
October
April
August
Olive Emilie Albertine Schreiner is born.
Family moves to Healdtown.
Gottlob Schreiner is dismissed from the
ministry and becomes a general dealer
(shopkeeper).
Olive and Willie go to live with Theo and
Hetty. Olive meets Mrs. Cawood.
Olive visits the John Hemmings.
Olive visits her Qrpen cousins, ostensibly
as governess.
Olive stays with aunt, Mrs. Rolland; Emmie
Hope, Mrs. Rolland's daughter, also there.
Olive goes to stay with Emmie Hope and
family.
Olive stays with Reverend Robinson's
family, ostensibly as governess. She
meets the Gaus.
i - *
Ul
Year Place
Figure
Month/Day
1872
1873
1874
1875
1876
Hertzog
Kimberly (New Rush)
/
Fraserburg
Cape Town
Hertzog
Colesberg
Cradock (Klein
Ganna Hoek)
Ratel Hoek
August
November
November
February
April
May 20
May
May
August 26
(contd.)
Event
Olive returns to her parents' home. She
writes Kate announcing her engagement to ,
Julius Gau. 1
Olive goes to stay with Het and Theo in the
diamond fields (nothing further said about ;
Gau) . She starts working on Undine. ;
t
Olive visits with sister Alice and family; I
she meets Dr. and Mrs. Brown.
Olive visits Miss Hemming, Alice's sister- j
in-law. She advertises for a governess j
position.
Olive visits with her parents.
Olive takes a governess position with the
George Weakley family.
Olive takes a new position as governess
with the Stoffel Fouche family. (The
Cawoods live nearby at Ganna Hoek.)
Olive becomes governess with the Reverend
Martin family.
Reverend Gottlob Schreiner dies.
Figure 1 (contd.)
Year___________ Place__________ Month/Day_______________ Event
1877 Ratel Hoek Olive is at work on African Farm. She
also starts Saints & Sinners (later called
From Man to Man) and finishes Undine.
1879 Ganna Hoek March Olive goes to stay with the Cawoods (a
temporary arrangement) as governess to the
children.
Lelie Kloof
1880 Lelie Kloof
1881 Lelie Kloof
August
January
Olive takes a position with the Fouche's
again, this time on a new farm. She
completes work on African Farm.
Olive sends manuscript of African Farm to
the Browns, now in Edinburgh, asking them
to find publisher.
Olive revises manuscript-, returned by the
Browns.
Grahamstown
Cape Town
February Olive visits her mother, now living as a
guest in a Roman Catholic convent.
March Olive leaves for London on the steamship
Kinfauns Castle.
H
- ■ j
*Based on a chronology and itinerary developed by Margaret Cartwright, Senior Librarian,
Manuscripts Department, South African Library, Cape Town, South Africa, and, coinci
dentally, a great-grandniece of Olive Schreiner. 7/79.
Figure 2
The Cape as it was during Olive Schreiner1s youth
OfIANGE FREE RIVER STATE
P n lo l K IM B E R LEY
> O u T o l|'iP iji
*Klmb«ri«ir '* / ”
\{Newnmh] 1 "
GRIOUALAND WEST Broamfontaln
\ x "
\
Umpukint
T T ibd urtehu
Harmon
P h n i p p o t u
CAPE COLONY
Da Aat«
R ic h m o n d
Cotosbarg )f COLESBERO
BurgNrsdorp
AUWAU NORTH
Mlddfbut //•D 0 , d r # e h '
i / /qu
FRASERBURO
Fraittbura
^ A T L A N T IC
—P C S A N—
QuHiuiswn
CfldocK ffljluU d
L t *
CRADOCK
The Cape as It was
during Olive
Schreiner's youth
GraN Raynst
Fort Eaiyfort
GREAT KAROO
O r . F J i h / e ■Hu r ik eusUrvg rail
projaciad ran
exlitlog roadi
( t + ^+++++++++ M i U f l j f o n l a l n
W o re oiler
□nhamitown
Z A tQ o * Say
Cap* Town
WynborQ* P o e t E U tab o m
M a xli ting track*
WOMN OCEAN
From Ruth First and Ann Scott, Olive Schreiner, p. 36.
CHAPTER III
Religious and Missionary Influences
One of the staunchest positions Olive Schreiner held
■throughout her adult life was that of an avowed "Free-
Thinker," one who rejected the teachings of the organized
Christian church.^ She summarized her religious views in
|a letter written in 18 92 to a Presbyterian minister, himself j
^undergoing a crisis of faith, as follows: j
i I
! If you ask me what is my religion, it is '
j hard for me to answer, because we human i
i beings have not framed speech for the !
■ purpose of expressing such thoughts— but j
if I must put it into words I would say:
! The Universe is One, and It Lives; or, if *
you would put it into older phraseology,
I would say: There is Nothing but God.
. . . Personally I owe nothing to the
teachings of Jesus: except the 5th and ,
6th chapters of Matthew no part of his
teachings morally ever touched me as a
child, and from the time I was 14 when I
ceased to read the Bible or go to church |
■ Christianity has been almost' non-existent
! to me.^ j
; I
; Her freethinking views had two distinct parts: a 1
pronounced anti-Christian bias and a positive deism stripped
of Christian references. In the development of the former, j
the religious teachings received as a child were decisive.
Her father, a German-born minister, came to Africa in 1
• i
1837 as a missionary to preach the gospel message for the
multidenominational London Missionary Society (LMS). He,
like most of the early LMS missionaries, preached an un-
varnished Calvinist theology, stressing the eternal
damnation of the unbaptized along with the unredeemed
depravity of the baptized in the eyes of the Lord, who
demanded total and unquestioning obedience to His will, as
revealed in the Holy Scriptures.
In the Schreiner home, weekday evening prayers for the
|
jfamily and servants were obligatory. Sunday was entirely ]
devoted to a morning prayer meeting, two or three church 1
i [
Iservices during the day, Bible study and the sober contem- j
i ■ i
plation of the meaning of the Lord's Day in the remaining j
■ 4
'hours. Reverend Schreiner had a penchant for the sermons ;
; b i
of Jeremy Taylor, who was given to expound on the torments j
i
iof hell, "compr.is [ing] as many torments as the body of man
i
^has joints, sinews, arteries, etc., being caused by the
i
‘ penetrating and real fire of which this temporal fire is i
i i
1 5 ■
but a painted fire*f r ■ j
\ J
Olive Schreiner's early novels gave evidence of the |
1 i
childhood fear and sense of wickedness such teaching in- '
I
flicted. In them, she wrote almost identical scenes
depicting the terror of a child confronted with a vengeful,
pitiless God, both involving a ticking timepiece' (in Undine,
6 !
it is a clock on the wall; in African Farm, a ticking
■ 7. :
hunter's watch.) Listening to the ticking, the child
envisions time marching along, in inexorable seconds,
^carrying thousands of sinners off to Hell with each stroke. j
(The child begs God to spare those lost souls, swearing to
make any personal sacrifice He asks if even only one were
spared. In the end, she [he] knows that God will never
g
relent and that the souls are damned for eternity.
• In another actual experience depicted in African Farm,
! 9 j
j"The Sacrifice," the boy Waldo kneels under the noontime |
|sun before a tiny stone altar upon which he placed his |
dinner chop. He bows his head reverently, confident that
;God will acknowledge his unbounding faith with fire from '
■Heaven to consume the sacrifice. The sign never comes,
! I
'although he prays under the blazing sun all day. When he
f
returns to the farm at night, he is filled with loathing
at his own sinfulness, made so obvious to him by God’s
;deliberate rejection of the offering.^
; Instead of teaching her the necessity of obedience to
I I
;God, the experiences nurtured great disquiet. The disquiet :
i ;
jturned triumphant when, at age seven, she discovered Jesus’ j
Sermon on the Mount in the New Testament. She read the ;
'passage "with amazement and delight; it reflected, put into
definite language, much that she had deeply but vaguely
.felt."As Cronwright paraphrased the incident:
She rushed off to her mother, who was ;
sitting with some friends. . . . 'Look
what I've found! Look what I've found!
1 It's what I've known all along! Now
we can live like this!' Her mother
tried to put her off, but the child would
not be denied. . . . It was only after
some time and cold words of reproof that
the amazed child was silenced. But she
never forgot it, and knew then for the
first time that people did not want to
live like that, although it was God's
command which they professed to accept.
She said she never got over the shock.3 2
It is significant that at this early age she already
felt there was something wrong with the religion embraced
by the family. Since she could not conceive of hypocrisy
i
t
jon so fundamental a matter, her logical conclusion was that
i
►
;the only reason Jesus1 message was ignored was because no
j
one realized that it was there!
[ j
When Olive was nine, her two-year old sister, Ellie, j
died. The event was traumatic, for Olive had raised the !
child and loved her passionately; after the baby died, she
insisted on sleeping beside the cold body and later sat by
13 ■ 1
the grave for many hours, This too became a crisis of j
' j
;faith. Years later, she wrote a friend: "It was her j
death . . . which first made me realize the falsity of what |
14 . I
I had been taught and made a freethinker of me." Olive j
must have felt that she could no longer accept the teachings
of a God so cruel as to cut off the life of an innocent
child. Shortly afterwards, she shocked her family by. j
' 15
declaring that she would no longer attend church. j
It seems clear that Olive’s apostasy was a self- |
induced conversion. She was too young at the time to have
read any of the rationalist literature of the 18th and 19th
centuries with which she later buttressed her anti-Christian:
j
jbeliefs; nor had she as yet met anyone who professed any
freethinking ideas. ^
In the intervening years, from the time Ellie died
iuntil she completely ceased to read the Bible or attend
church, Olive lived principally with her older brother
jTheo and her sister Hetty, both confirmed Christians in her
father’s mold. What rebellion Gottlob Schreiner's preach-
i 17
ing began, harrassment by Theo and Hetty completed. I
■ t
i Both Theo and Hetty unequivocally condemned her views, j
' • i
The intensity of Hetty's feelings against Olive's stance was
I
revealed in letters she later wrote to Olive after under-
1 f
going a change of heart. Regretting her previous casti- !
gations of her little sister, Hetty wrote abject letters,
imploring forgiveness: :
[Nov. 4, 1870]': I cannot tell you how
| bitterly the past weighs on me. . . . j
j Words and thoughts never noticed at the
time stand before me hideous and horrible,
' but I thank God I know you do love me.
. . . I know, my dear Em [i.e., Olive]
that you do believe in my love, however
fully dark spots the outer signs may have :
been . .
Three weeks later, she wrote again:
[Nov. 26, 187 0]’: When I got your letter, j
I burst out sobbing and crying. . . . I ;
felt every day I had woefully failed. . . .
: How happy it would make me if you could
say with truth that you were not very !
1 miserable with us; . . .
There were other letters in the same vein.
23
By the time Olive was sixteen, her freethinking was
established. When she visited the Robinson family in
Dordrecht, Reverend Robinson acknowledged that he already
knew "she had left some of the main tracks of theological
'thought, i.e., the Supernatural in the Bible and in the
20
Person of Christ." At the age of eighteen, her church-
going friend, Mary Brown, spoke casually of Olive's
21
"'heresies' 1 and unorthodox views."
i , i
| Once she abandoned the tenets of formal Christianity,
■Olive never relented, although her views later cost her botti
! i
money and a valued friendship. At a time when she was
I I
desperately trying to save money in order to go to England, j
; i
;she had to accept a governess position f or £ 20 a year ;
!instead of the expected £70 because she refused to teach
22
;religion to the children. Later, a warm and, she
( i
I thought, enduring friendship with an older woman, Erilda .
i i
,Cawood (at the time her only close friend), was abruptly j
j 1
rut short when Mrs. Cawood turned against her because she " j
* I
I
thought Olive had infected the Cawood children with her J
anti-Christian ideas: "Richard and I have both, while
pointing out to the children that they owe you gratitude,
itold1 them that you are God’s enemy and that they cannot
i
23
;love God and you at the same time." Although Olive was
hurt by this unanticipated rejection from one in whom she
ihad felt so close, she accepted her friend’s pronouncement
I
I 24 1
irather than alter her views. !
The Reverend Schreiner served not only as a minister
but as a missionary as well. Because of Olive's strong
pro-African views in later years, one might have expected
( the missionary work to have exercised a positive effect;
*
As -one historian later wrote:
. . . the missionaries, then and long
after, were almost the only people who
worked with and spoke up for the African.
Authoritarian and paternalistic though i
! many of them were, they built some frail
| bridges of understanding, trust and ,
j respect which somehow survived great i
j stresses . . ."25
; If the missionary work influenced her in any way, the
record does not show it.
| >
; There is, of course, no contemporary written account ;
i
of missionary life from Olive, since she was only ten when
her father left the station. In accounts of her childhood
i , 1
made later in life, she did; not mention whether or not i
: t
i
|she had direct contact with the tribal natives, associated j
with black children in the mission school, attended church j
services with them, visited blacks in their homes, or
s
accompanied her father when he went out to preach Christian
2 6
doctrine to the unconverted.
I
The only mention she . made of the missionary experience
was lightly to describe her father's work as teaching
"the little niggers in school and preach[ing] on Sunday in
Ithe mud-floored chapel . . . happy if he had an old nigger
woman to convert . . . or he could get someone to teach a
27
new German tune to.”
She did not connect her mother with mission-related
activity; when she wrote of her mother's life, it was in
28
connection with the drudgery of domestic chores, not work
! 29
involved at the mission.
The only contemporary account of the Schreiner life
during the missionary period is found in the Kate Schreiner
jcorrespondence, The Findlay Letters; and this gives, not
'so much a picture of missionaries at work as of the English
Imissionary community. In the letters, there was no mention
i
|of the converted Africans as being part of the community
I
i(nor of the unconverted ones either); the only mention of
I
i
^natives at all was in connection with tribal disturbances
in general and the attack on the Umpukani mission where
;Gottlob served for a while.
I
One can only conclude that, though Olive Schreiner
i
took an unequivocal stand in support of black Africans in
later years, she did not feel strongly about the supportive
role the missionaries took toward them which might have
ccuhter balanced her pronounced anti-Christian viewpoint.
26
I
CHAPTER IV
Social and Sexual Roles on the South African Karoo
Just as Olive Schreiner's own perceptions led her to
I
!develop her distinctive freethinking views, so her insight
regarding the roles of men and women in the European
society of South Africa in the 1860s and 1870s, as she
observed them, was the source from which developed her
|
'ardent feminist ideology.
| Her ideas took two forms: perceptions arising from
the manifest inequality of women in their domestic and
economic roles, as compared to men (i.e., the existence
of a double standard); and perceptions regarding the
tensions between men and women.
j Her views regarding the status of women were laid out
[explicitly in African Farm, particularly in the chapter
j -
'entitled "Lyndall." Lyndall voiced most of Olive's early j
opinions about the inequality of women, views which were
fully formed by the time she was twenty. They did not
abate over the years; in fact, they became more pronounced
as she grew older. (
Lyndall described how the conditioning started at a
f I
Very early age:
We sit at the window . . . and look out
at the boys in their happy play. We want
i to go. Then a loving hand is laid on us.
1
i
i ‘ 27
'Little one, you cannot go,' they say.
. . . 'Your nice white dress will be
spoiled.’ We feel it must be for our
good, it is so lovingly said; but we
cannot understand. . . . [Then] the
curse begins to act on us. It finishes
its work when we are grown women, no
more look out wistfully at a more
healthy life; we are contented. We
fit our sphere as a Chinese woman's
foot fits her shoe, exactly as though
God had made both; yet he knows nothing
of either.2
|She spoke bitterly of the plight of women as sex objects:
| Look at this little chin of mine, Waldo, j
! with the dimple in it. It is but a small
part of my person; but though I had knowl-
j edge of all things under the sun . . . it
would not stead me like this little chin. |
j . . . I once heard an old man say that he
i never saw intellect help a woman so much
j as a pretty ankle; and it is the truth.3
!
;She complained against men who expected women to be happy in
decorative roles rather than professional ones:
When we ask to be doctors, lawyers, law
givers, anything but ill-paid drudges,
they say, 'No; but you have men's chival- j
rous attention; now think of that and be j
satisfied.'^ j
f
Finally, Lyndall pointed out to Waldo the perniciousness of |
I
a system that forbade women to use their talents produc- j
tively:
Yes, we have power; and since we are not
to expend it in tunnelling mountains, nor !
healing diseases, nor making laws, nor j
money . . . we expend it on you. You are i
our goods, our merchandise, our material
for operating on; we buy you, we sell you,
we make fools of you; . . .5
28 i
jAll of these ideas were later presented in her lengthy non- j
fiction thesis on the history and development of women as
part (or not part) of the productive work force, Woman and
Labour.
Her views initially grew out of her early observations
of the true relationship between her mother and father. Of
her parents, it was her mother who was the more cultured
|and talented. Her mother's English family was well-to-do
and fairly high in Dissenting ministry social circles;^ i
I . j
■her father had not been able to fulfill the academic t
1 7 t
■requirements for ordination in Basel. Yet Rebecca ;
:Schreiner never had an opportunity to use her many talents; j
! the LMS ordained that the missionary calling be open only j
to men. In later years, Olive reminisced about the
barreness of her mother's life; 1
! ■
j Poor little Rebekah, with her brilliant ,
! little head, that might have been a j
i preacher's, an advocate's, or a doctor’s \
i (how she pored over her bits of medical '
| books!), with her little white hands, that, j
! after forty years of labour, of the cook
ing of dinner, and the making of pairs of j
shoes, and the white-washing of rooms, and
the sweeping of yards, and the rearing of :
one dozen babies, were still as fine and
soft as a princess's--poor little Rebekah
began her lifelong drudgery. . . . If a
' grand piano could be supposed to have a
soul, and after it were finished it were
shut up, and left locked all its existence, i
: not played on by anybody, and used as a
common dining-table, being vaguely conscious
all the time of the other uses it might
have been put to under other circumstances,
then, I think, it would feel like little
i Rebekah.9
29
In her own home, she saw the unequal treatment of the
sexes as far as education was concerned. It was taken for
granted that the three boys would be sent to school in
England; Gottlob importuned the Wesleyan mission office in
London constantly for an increase in salary so he could do
|just that.^-0 By the same token, no effort was made to
jeducate the four girls, although Alice did attend a ladies'
1 - V !
I • 1 1 " 1
jSchool in Cape Town for a short while. The education was j
^scarcely comparable. As for her own education, Olive
;noted that "the only education she ever had was what she
i 1 2
picked up from her mother and from her reading."
! The inequality of professional job opportunities was j
f !
implicit in the unequal educational opportunities for the
j
sexes. But Schreiner perceived that social attitudes as !
well as education determined the "proper" jobs available
to men and women. In her early novel, Undine, she j
j *
i ,
jdescribed Undine's predicament when she was stranded in j
Port Elizabeth without food or a place to stay; j
i
If she had been a man she might have j
thrown off her jacket and set to work
instantly, . . .[and] made enough in
half an hour to pay for a bed at one
of the lower hotels, might have wandered
about the town, seen something of life,
and enjoyed herself in a manner.' As it
was, being only a woman . . . she stood
: there in the street, feeling very weak,
bodily, after her illness, and mentally,
after her long life of servitude and
dependence— very weak and very heartsick.
30
! Olive perceived that her mother, unable to exercise ;
;her formidable talents elsewhere, used her position in the
home as a base of her power.' In the home, Rebecca was the
authority figure. She not only did the menial work and bore
the children; she also set the standards, bullied her
I 14 15
^husband, supervised the servants, punished the children.
;Her father, ostensibly the head of the household, was by
Jfar the weaker, the less decisive of the two. The children
! !
joften saw him almost as a "co-conspirator" against
' 1 6 '
Rebecca.
: ■ I
! |
The picture of Otto, the German overseer in African !
Farm, was regarded by all the family as a true portrait of
! 17 '
.Gottlob Schreiner. On the surface, Otto appears a good-
! i
^hearted, almost Christ-like innocent whose devotion to God '
'opens him up to the meanness of'the world. A closer reading
; t
of the character shows Otto to be a man who avoids
responsibility, and who, . in the name of doing God's work,
refuses to act wisely and with concern for his family. j
This probably was what Olive felt her father to be really j
like.
i
Olive observed the actual relationship between men
and women as she moved in and out of other homes and other
jplaces during her wandering from 187 0 to 187 4. Most of
the people with whom she stayed were well-off, with
business connections or in well-established missionary
I
I 31
centers. It was a society in which women had little
function other than decorative, much absorbed in gossip
1 O
and social affairs of the church;x social status and
19
material wealth must have been a preoccupation as well.
One gets a glimpse of this aimlessness in Olive's
‘ description of women on holiday (with its suggestion of
coquetry), on a trip she and Hetty made in 1872:
We started on Saturday at two o'clock
| . . . with only one travelling companion,
I a young Englishman whose face I did not
j once see, . . . .We got to Pniel at sunset
I and had just time to dress before supper.
I Another young Englishman tried to be very
| pleasant but we were very cold and he gave
j it up and did not speak to us again. After
| sup. was done we went for a walk to the
> river. . . . The next morning we went after
i breakfast for a walk on the banks again and
J got some most beautiful flowers and . . .
just before we left . . . a white man came
up to us and tried to get us to enter into
conversation with him, offering to take us
for a row in his boat and at last went
away. In the afternoon we went for another
walk up the river. . . . We then went home
! and had supper after which we went for a
' walk on the hill and then down to the
' river. We started . . . Monday morning in
! a cart with 6 other pas. one of whom was a
j Frenchman and the other a Mr. R., with
very blue eyes and a bad mouth. . .
While there was nothing in Olive Schreiner's experi-
E
ences that differed in any major respect from those felt
1
by other women of her class and station, only she seemed
aware of the injustice of the situation. By the time she
wrote African Farm in 1877, her feminist views were fully
formed and unequivocal.
32
I
Certainly her dependency as an unmarried woman with no !
i
money, no education, and no ostensible talents other than
those she might exercise in snaring a husband, must have
preyed upon her as she moved about from house to house. In
. African Farm she had sharp words to say about women who use
j 21
itheir wiles to capture a husband, although she made it
j
jclear that the bleak prospect of being old and unmarried
I 22
did not offer much of an alternative.
I
! Other than marriage, the only other option open to a !
i !
'woman of no means was to become independent by taking a j
| !
:job; and the only positions permitted "ladies of good j
!
breeding" in the mid-1800s was that of woman's companion,
I
'school teacher, or governess. Olive advertised for a
i
governess position in 187 4, when she was nineteen, and
soon was hired to teach the two children of a Mr. George
'Weakley.
j Under the best of circumstances, the position of a
I
^Victorian governess was difficult. The job was one of
low social status with poor pay, the governess being subject
!to demeaning treatment from both the mistress and the
23
children in the classroom. In Olive's case, her situation
was made appreciably more difficult by the fact that she
was young, attractive, and unsophisticated; she desperately
needed the job; the family with whom she lived was neither ;
i
well-educated nor cultured; and the household arrangement
'such that the master was in and about the home most of the j
day. It was inevitable that abuses would occur.
At the Weakleys1 her workload was one of unremitting
drudgery. Besides teaching the children, Olive was expec
ted to do domestic chores before school began, supervise
the servants during class hours when Mrs. Weakley was
helping at the store, help wait on the trade in the store
Luring the afternoon, and make and mend clothing for the
;children after supper.2^ Later, Weakley required her to
help him correct copy for his newspaper. j
j Weakley found the new employee attractive— and let j
! . !
Olive know. Ellis recorded her description of the experi-
| i
'ence: j
I ■ !
I This man tyrannized over her and at the i
; same time wanted to kiss her; at last he )
did something which made her leave. . . .
i [But] she was unable to get anything else
to do so stayed a month longer. At the I
j end the man said 'You stayed for your own j
pleasure' and paid her nothing.25 t
The ignominy of her helplessness and dependence
j
experienced there buttressed a theme she expanded on years
i
later about the imperative of economic independence for
J
women who wish to exercise real options. Her only allusion [
to the Weakley incidents was a passage in African Farm
in which Lyndall sneers at men's primitive "appetites?';
A Hottentot sits at the road side, and
1 feeds on a rotten bone . . . takes out
his bottle of Cape smoke, . . . and the
I cultured child of the nineteenth century
j sits in his armchair and sips choice wines
with the lip of a connoisseur .... Heavy
jaw and sloping forehead— all have gone with
increasing intellect; but the animal appetites
are still there— refined, discriminative,
but immeasurably intensified.
Not until she was eighteen years old did she meet a
couple who presented, for the first time, a positive role
^model of what a happy, fulfilling relationship between a
!man and a woman might be. This was Dr. John Brown and his
!wife, Mary Solomon Brown, whom she met while visiting her
i
'sister Alice. Although church-going Christians themselves,
]
jthe Browns were very tolerant of Olive's freethinking
i
t (
iviews, in contrast to the intolerance she had previously
t 27
encountered. Their marital relationship seemed to Olive
28
■almost ideal. Dr. Brown sympathized with Olive's icono
clastic views since he and his wife were a fairly un-
29
orthodox pair themselves; and he encouraged her to
investigate job opportunities opening up for women in the
■medical profession. It was through his urging that Olive
30
decided to go into nursing when she got to England.
| Even after the Browns left for Scotland, Olive
■continued to keep in touch with them. When she finished
African Farm, Mary Brown was the first person to whom she
;sent it for a critique, and she in turn located someone
t
[
,in the publishing business in Edinburgh who gave Olive's
i 3 1
:manuscript its initial, professional review. In
jgratitude, Olive subsequently dedicated the second edition
32
;of her novel to Mary Brown.
This friendship with the Browns was the only relation- j
I ship from which she drew positive support to buttress her
views about the relation between the sexes. For the most
part, they were constructed out of her own evaluation of
what she observed and experienced in the society in which
,she lived.
i
t
CHAPTER V
Books and Formative Ideas
In no other area was Olive Schreiner's early percep
tion and insight more evident that in her choice and
assessment of reading matter. While evidence drawn from
her journal is incomplete, a pattern seems evident.^"
\ It is always difficult to evaluate the influence of
i
!literature upon an individual, even when the person
|
’acknowledges the debt. Did reading the book transform the
■individual's views, enabling her or him to see the world
I
i
Iin an entirely new light? Or did the book merely reinforce
Jideas already held, confirming convictions already in
j
i
jplace? Did the work have a long-lasting, even cumulative
:effect? Or did it serve as a momentary catalyst, triggering
1 I
thinking or action which eventually took an altogether |
: i
different turn? j
I . I
i j
j According to Olive Schreiner, who was more articulate '
i
about the books she read than about other influences in
'her life, books fulfilled all these functions.
' Some books she read were catalytic agents. They ;
^ I
started her thinking on her own, opening up vistas she might
not have seen had it not been for that work. Once the :
i I
.book served this purpose, she had no more use for it. '
j One such book was the most influential literary work '
2
of her pre-adolescent years, the Bible. For the first
ten years of her life it possibly was the only book she
read every day; it certainly was the first major piece of
literature to which she was exposed. Besides being
thoroughly familiar with its contents, she was attracted
to its literary style;^ Biblical imagery and allusions were
evident in all her major works. But once she began to
perceive its contradictions, ripples of doubt engulfed
her. "The agony of my childhood," she wrote the Reverend
J. L. Lloyd, "was the impossibility of reconciling the
direct perception from which I never could shake myself
4
free with what I was taught" in the Bible. When at last,
\ in a great crisis of faith, she freed herself from the
i pieties of Christianity, she stopped reading the Bible.
I i
I
! Fortunately, Schreiner was able to find a substitute
for the religious assurances she had lost when she read
j another great work, Herbert Spencer's First Principles.
J At the age of sixteen, she was lent a copy of the book
J ,
by a visiting government functionary, a Mr. Willie
i •
: Bertram, who stopped at the mission station at Hermon
I |
j where she was then staying. When she read it, it was a ]
j case of instant recognition; the arguments which Spencer^ |
! put forth were the ones which immediately explained what j
! she already intuitively knew. She wrote, "I always think j
that when Christianity burst on the dark Roman world it
5
was what the book was to me.” Spencer's work helped her
defuse the guilt feelings her religious apostasy caused,
giving her a new perspective on the Universe. As she
|later told Havelock Ellis, Spencer "helped me believe in a
unity underlying all nature; that was a great thing.
But*once the work did this for her, it had served its
purpose. When Ellis asked her about Spencer in 1884, she
; said:
t
i
; If one has a broken leg and the doctor
j sets it, when once it is set one may be
said to have no more need of the doctor,
nevertheless one always walks on his leg.
I think that is how it is with regard to
myself and Herbert Spencer. I have read
all his works since, some three or four
times, now I read him no more.?
! As a precocious child, Olive began to read very early,
i
t
and read whatever she could. By the age of seven, she was
reading Coleridge and Tennyson; the Reverend Zadoc
i
jRobinson, a friend of the family visiting at the time,
|recalled the ease by which she recited the poetry to him,
i
‘astounding him with the "tone and accuracy" of her
rendition. But whether or not poetry influenced her life
or her writing is not known. With the exception of
Shelley, she did not mention reading any poetry at all.
i Nor did she seem to have read much fiction. The
ionly notation in her journal was to Dickens' Dombey and
; 9
I Sons, read while visiting her parents in 1872. Consid
J
|ing that she began writing short stories shortly after
this, and within two years was hard at work writing her
own novel; one must presume that her writing style and
concept of the novel structure were developed on her own,
uninfluenced by the use of literary models.
It was the world of ideas that dominated Schreiner's
reading; books of ideas attracted her as no other books
did. Works on philosophy, natural science, history, and
political economy predominated. A chart of her major
jreading matter from 1872 through 188 0 shows an astonishing
l
jpenchant for books which are profound, ponderous, and, to
j
|a less dedicated reader, formidable. For one who had had
j
jno formal education, the ability to read and understand
(them, even on a superficial level, indicated the strongest
t
^compulsion for enlightenment.
Her reading list, extrapolated from her journals, is
10
as follows:
1871 Herbert Spencer
Robert Chambers :1871-2
1873
Henry Liddell
John Stuart Mill
Arthur Helps
Henry T. Buckle
Charles R. Darwin
First Principles
Vestiges of the Natural
History of Creation
Student1s Rome
Principles of Political
Economy
The* Spanish Conquest in
America (4 vols.)
History of Civilization in
England
The Descent of Man
40'
1874 Ralph Waldo Emerson
1875 Percy Bysshe Shelley
John Ruskin
Thomas Huxley
Charles Darwin
John Stuart Mill
1876 Johann W. Von Goethe
Michel Montaigne
1877 Edward Gibbon
Henry Hallam
Essays
Prometheus Unbound
The Crown of Wild Olives
Lay Sermons
Variation in Plants and
Animals under Domestication
System of Logic
Faust
Essays
The Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire
Introduction to the History
of Literature in Europe
W.E.H. Lecky History of European Morals
188 0 Johann W. von Goethe Wilhelm Meister
Olive Schreiner was fairly articulate about what many
of these books and authors meant to her. Often, the
author meant more than the works. She enjoyed Shelley,
for example, and found Prometheus Unbound "spiritual and
11
beautiful." But, while she later spoke of loving
Shelley, it probably was the qualities of the man that
attracted her to the poetry: his atheism, his iconoclasm,
his idealism— and his early and "romantic" demise.
Even as a child, she stood in awe of the world of
intellect and of the men who strove for truth and knowl
edge with an open mind. Those men who took this approach
were men to whom she later acknowledged the greatest
41
12
intellectual debt. One such person was John Stuart Mill.
Another was Charles Darwin, to whom she was introduced
through Herbert Spencer. Of them she said (in Cronwright's
paraphrase):
there were two men whom everybody should
read at least something of, Mill and Darwin;
it was an education to do so, whether you
agreed with them or not, because you thus
came into close contact with two men of great
knowledge, great intellect, and absolute love
of truth; men who wanted truth and nothing
else, no matter what it cost them, no matter
how on discovery it might run counter to their
already tentatively formed ideas or even to
what they might have already thought was
established. It was their single-minded
search for truth, their intellectual honesty
and directness, and their fine human sym
pathies that (in addition to the possession
of minds well-adapted for the search for
truth) . . .[one] valued. Merely reading
I them, living for a time with such minds,
; was . . . an education for anyone.13
| The frame of reference Olive used to describe these
i
men's contributions was significant; in her novel African
Farm, her own concern for the pursuit of truth is expressed
| with religious intensity. In one of the more notable
i sections of the book, she constructed a long allegorical
; i
i
tale about a, man1s search for truth, one which reads like |
; the trials of Christian in Pilgrim's Progress. It is a j
j story a stranger tells to one of the characters, Waldo,
i
| about a hunter who consumes his entire life in a vain
i t j
| search for the snow-white Bird of Truth, breaking the tip
| of his Shuttle of Imagination to cut steps up the mountain
of Stern Reality beyond which he must go, knowing,that he
42
will never reach the top. In the end, as the man dies,
broken, a snow-white feather wafts down to rest on his
lifeless fingers.14
But Schreiner's most characteristic reaction to the
great writers she read was one of instant identification;
when she read what they had written, it was, she said, as
if she herself wrote it. This is how she described
Emerson's work.- Following Willie Bertram's advice, she
bought a copy of his Essays while visiting Cape Town early
15
in 187 4 and read him for the first time. Years later,
the poet and critic, Arthur Symons, wrote about Olive's
feelings for Emerson:
There is one writer of whom she feels . . .
there is nothing he has ever said, not a
half sentence— that she does not absolutely
agree with, and feel: "That is what I
think." . . . His Essays came to her when
she was about eighteen. She took the book
| and opened it as she was going up the stairs.
| She opened on the essay on Self-Reliance. . . .
| And she sat down on the stairs, and read on
and on, . . . Emerson was . . . giving her
just what she felt she wanted.
; To Havelock Ellis she described Emerson as being "an
17
expression of her highest self." It was a case of the
1 author reinforcing ideas and feelings which she already
! recognized as her own, assuring her that she was not' alone
■ in holding views with which, it seemed, everyone else
I
: disagreed.
i
She found the same compatibility in Goethe. When she
read Faust, she felt the way she felt when she read
Emerson: "I am reading Faust, and feel as if I had written
She also found Goethe a source of inspiration. After
reading Wilhelm Meister, she spoke of his giving her
courage to endure what she saw was her heavy lot:
I was struck in reading Wilhelm Meister
by the marvelous unity between all thinking
minds of a certain order. I am determined
to be fearless; let every man speak out
from the depth of his heart, and take the
result, cooly. However bad things are we
can endure them in silence and take joy in
enduring.
Years later, Olive told a story of a more forceful
jreaction to this work, realizing then that Goethe was not
i
’ as easily accessible as were other authors she read. As
| Symons described it:
I Once she saved all her money, for months,
i to buy Wilhelm Meister. Arid when she got
| it, she opened it, and began to read. And
j it was the bitterest disappointment she ever
! had. She -shut it up and flung it away:
j "This Wilhelm Meister?— this? Here
is about a man who keeps puppets: what do I
' care about puppets?" She thought it was
coarse, and her moral nature— the nature of
sin, for right and wrong— was roused by its
frivolity. Then, long after, she was some
where and had no other book. She took it up
i and read it through . . . then, afterwards,
it all dawned upon her— the revelation of this
j calm impersonal art— not hatred of wrongdoing,
j but simply understanding it and painting life
! as it is. And it has helped to break or
i weaken her overwhelming sense of sin, that
| conscience which she inherits from her Puritan
i ancestors. 2 0
.M
i Symons pointed out Goethe's influence in her ending
of African Farm. "Lyndall’s death is not ’retribution1/'
he made clear, "it is due to disease- She meant to show
the struggle of helpless human nature against the great
21
forces of the universe— a-sheer physical struggle."
Montaigne was another author who, like Goethe, was
not immediately "accessible." In the same journal entry
in which she wrote of Faust, Olive noted; "I have got
22
I Montaigne's Essays; I have not got the spirit yet."
| Eventually she was able to understand him; and she added
j his essay "Friendship" to those which she found compatible.
| But of all the books she read, there was one work
[ which she felt transformed her and exercised a major
I
| influence upon her, although what that influence was
; cannot be readily shown. Edward Gibbon’s Decline and Fall
I of the Roman Empire was a book Olive read over and over
; again, all her life. Her husband recalled;
i
1 she would read it often, probably when her
own reading or thought brought it to mind,
and then she would read with complete ab
sorption, with a curious concentration not
given to any other book for long. At inter
vals, while so absorbed, she would get up
from where she was reading, perhaps on the
bed in her room, and come to me, and in the
'most brilliant and illuminating manner, take
: something he had said, and speak on it and
; show its meaning and often its bearing on
' modern conditions. At other times she might
| : be seen suddenly to put the volume down, jump
: up and pace up and down lost in thought. I
I ■ think she knew it better than any other book
, except perhaps the Bible. Of all the books
that appealed to her when young. Gibbon's
great history is the only one of which her
knowledge grew more profound and accurate,
and for which her love and admiration went
on increasing with age.23
It appears clear that Schreiner found in the world of
the intellect direction and sustenance. One might argue
that an understanding of the works of such major thinkers
must have been far beyond a person with as limited an
education and background as she had. What is important,
however, is that Olive Schreiner did not think so. To
the degree to which she attributed the direction of her
thinking to these sources, to that degree they influenced
her in a real if perhaps immeasurable way.
CHAPTER VI
Conclusion
When Olive Schreiner left South Africa for England, the
effect of these Cape Colony experiences upon her creative
talent was not yet evident. But a review of these forma
tive influences show a number of singular features.
In' 18 81, her freethinking views against organized
religion and in favor of a phenomenon-oriented universe
of reason were fixed. But her beliefs did not come about
by reading or by knowing people who held these views.
They developed as a reaction against the religious
teachings in her home, in a personal unfolding of insight,
i
•unaided by others around her. The scientific rationale
| I
, she later encountered, which helped her substitute a
f
; rationalist creed for her lost religious faith, only
i
| reinforced perceptions she already knew to be true,
f By 1881, her views on women and their roles in society
i
I
were also fixed; and, thirty years later, she put those |
i
ideas into historical context in Woman and Labour. In |
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - j
i that book, she pointed out the pernicious effect of the j
! * i
! "parasitism" of women, deprived of any productive role
j
j other than the sexual one; and she marshalled surprisingly
! modern counterarguments against the denial of equal
I j
rights. But nothing she said later did more than embellishi
I the original incisive views she had Lyndall voice in
African Farm.
Her concept of feminism, held by no one she had ever
met,"*" grew out of her perception of the dominant/subservi
ent roles of men and women in Cape colony society. But
since her limited experience in the hinterland of the
karoo hardly seemed adequate to explain so all-inclusive a
thesis on "The Woman Question" (as the late-Victorians
: characterized it), one can only conclude that her under
standing was intuitive; she discerned patterns not evident
to others around her.
The same relationship held with regard to books she
! read, even those Schreiner herself claimed had great
, influence. While it is true that certain seminal works,
i
: such as Spencer's First Principles and Darwin's Descent of
Man, contributed to the rationalization of her freethinking
! beliefs, most of the books of ideas served to give
1 inspiration rather than instruction. Schreiner felt a
great affinity for the major thinkers whose concepts
coincided with hers; and if it is too presumptious to
say that she intuitively discerned what they labored hard
to prove, at least it is evident that her ideas developed
! out of her own integrative powers, from within herself
rather than from the outside.
The subject of the formative influences in Olive
Schreiner's life can not be closed without noting a
_________________ 48
number of anomalies which seem to suggest that this very
I
perceptive woman sometimes showed an uncharacteristic
lack of perception.
In the last decade of the 19th century, Schreiner
expressed strong pro-African sentiments, speaking out
against the prevailing white attitude on the "Native
2
Question." Yet nothing in her fiction or in the journals
as written in the 1870-1880 period indicated any awareness
of the natives1 struggles in wars which regularly erupted;
or of the political and economic tensions pitting tribal
blacks against the Boer farmers, even though the English
missionaries were intimately involved in the struggle.
As curious as this phenomenon is, another is even
I
. more baffling, with evidence so contradictory and ramifi-
; cations so huge that the matter is almost inexplicable.
; This is with regard to Olive's views on the Afrikaner.
‘ In later years, a major plank in Schreiner's
! egalitarian platform was support of the Boer cause. Next
i
| to her feminism, it was the most adamant set of principles
| she held. Her support of the Afrikaner cause, inter-
1 sected as it was by the South African War of 1899-1902,
cost her the friendship of many of her English friends
I
and supporters, led to personal reprisal by the British
I
, troops during the war, and in the end did not even bring
' her thanks from the Afrikaners in whose behalf she
wrote, spoke, and lobbied for twenty years.
From 187 4 to 1881, she lived and worked as a governess
with Afrikaans-speaking families and, to judge by her
journal entries, her experiences on the whole were
positive.
Yet in African Farm, Olive Schreiner drew a portrait
of a Boer woman which was nothing short of scurrilous,
Tant' Sannie is fat, bigoted, ignorant (and proud of it),
superstitious, grossly sensuous, and vindictive: a
caricature seemingly conceived by the most bigoted
English mind. (The fact that the other caricature in the
book, Boneparte Blenkins, is an invidious British
adventurer hardly offsets the impact of the Tant' Sannie
!
I portrait.) '
! Olive never explained what she was thinking of when |
i
j she drew the word picture; and sympathetic biographers,
| particularly those attracted by Schreiner's positive
I
: Afrikaner attitude, have been hard put to justify the j
! I
j characterization. Only one of two explanations seems !
j I
; possible. One is that this portrait really expressed
; what Olive subconsciously thought about Boer women at the j
f !
, time, an attitude which later counterbalancing influences
i
; overcame and reversed. Or else, the caricature was a
joke, an ironic statement of literary possibilities, and
Schreiner's positive posture with regard to the Afrikaner
\
■ i
was intact, both for the early years and the later period, j
An argument can be made for either position.
It is clear that the enigmatic element present through
out these crucial years, interacting with all the environ
mental factors, was ; ;ne woman's own inner discernment.
In combination with her literary talent, it permitted
Schreiner to speak both to her own generation and to later
ones. Through it, she was able to borrow from various
resources about her to arrive at original perceptions of
right and wrong, good and bad. If at times her perceptions
did not coincide with those of others, it did not matter.
‘She always saw herself as the hunter in the story told by
Waldo’s Stranger in African Farm. She knew she was
destined to chip out steps in mountains for others to
| climb; and if later'.1 generations forgot the name of the
!step-maker who preceded them, it was not important. She
I
I
!believed the effort itself was its own reward.
!
I
j But those who have read her books do care. Recog-
I
|nition in some measure, belated though it may be, is little
j enough due to one whose works are as moving today as they
i
j 1
! were in late-Victorian Great Britain. Appreciative of j
I !
! his light touch, supporters echo Bernard Shaw's sentiments, j
* j
: made to, an editor friend who criticized Schreiner's work:
I
j "I was inexpressibly shocked by your disparagement of
i !
jOlive Schreiner's volume. . . . You ought to walk to South :
i
}Africa and back with peas in your shoes by way of penance.
I 3
I What were you dreaming of? The book is a treasure."
51
Notes Chapter I
1. Olive Schreiner, The Story of an African Farm
(1833; rev. ed., Boston: Little, Brown, 1939), hereafter
cited as Afrioan Farm. All page references are to this
edition.
2. S. C. Cronwright-Schreiner, The Life of Olive
Schreiner (Boston: Little, Brown, 1924), p. 212.
3. Charles Dilke, Problems of Greater Britain
(London: Macmillan, 1890), p. 303.
4. Mary Brown, “Memories of my Friendship with Olive
j Schreiner," in Mrs. John Brown, 1847-1935, eds., Angela
| James and Nina Hills (London: John Murray, 1937), p. 188.
5. H. W. M. Massingham, ed., A Selection from the
I Writings of H. W. Massingham (New York: Harcourt, Brace,
[1925]), p. 181.
6. Vera Buchanan-Gould, Not Without Honour: The
,
1 Life and Writings of Olive Schreiner (London: Hutchinson,
[1948]), p. 68 .
7. Ruth First and Ann Scott, Olive Schreiner
. (New York: Schocken Books, 198 0), p. 371.
| 1
8. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 158.
i
| 9. "I have finished Olive's 'Journals1, made the
i
: necessary extracts and destroyed them— a necessary step.
Some things are pretty well closed up, I think— "
(Cronwright-Schreiner to Ellis, 25 May 1921, Cronwright-
i
Schreiner correspondence [Austin: Humanities Research
Center, University of TexasJ).
10. Cronwright-Schreiner, pp. 99-148, passim.
11. S. C. Cronwright-Schreiner, ed., The Letters of
Olive Schreiner (Boston: Little, Brown, 1924), pp. 2-9.
12. These letters were read by Ms. Betty McGinnis
Fradkin in 197 5, while still in the possession of
!Mr. Findlay, as part of her research on an Olive Schreiner
biography. Ms. Fradkin gave me her notes when she aban
doned her project. Ms. Fradkin's academic articles on
Olive Schreiner were published in the Quarterly Bulletin of
the South African Library (University of Cape Town, S.A.), j
1977, and Texas Quarterly (University of Texas, Austin), I
i
i 1980.
I
j 13. These biographies are listed in a separate
! section of the bibliography, together with other related
i
I
! Schreiner works.
i %
| 14. This letter is now part of the collection at
• I
i i
the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. I
I !
j 15. Betty Fradkin informed me that annotated notes j
j j
! by Cronwright-Schreiner in a copy of The Life of Olive j
I j
! Schreiner at the Cradock Public Library, S.. A., indicated i
that he knew of Julius Gau.' By ignoring the matter, he
perhaps hoped to prevent others from knowing. Thanks to
Cronwright, all direct evidence Olive gave regarding her
love life or sexual encounters in South Africa have been
deleted from the journal extracts published. Judging from
the assiduity with which he destroyed the originals, one
might infer that she had written with frankness about
both. See note 9, above.
Notes to Chapter II
1. The basic facts in this account were taken from
S. C. Cronwright-Schreiner's Life of Olive Schreiner
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1924). More recent and accurate
corrections have been included when relevant. An itinerary
of Olive Schreiner's movements for the period covered by
this paper (1855-1881) appears at the end of this chapter
as Figure 1, followed by a map, Figure 2, to help locate
the farms mentioned, identified in the text by geographic
location.
2. Although the Cronwright-Schreiner biography
I represents this transfer to the Wesleyan Society as
|amicable, motivated only by Reverend Schreiner's wish to
■remain in the Basuto area, later biographers First and
|Scott show from LMS records that he had been admonished
!by the Society and, at the time of the transfer, was
i
literally in disgrace. Schreiner chose to affiliate with
the Wesleyans as a matter of expedience (Ruth First and
Ann Scott, Olive Schreiner (New York: Schocken Books,
’ 1980,: p. 40);
j 3. Olive's siblings are designated in this work by
j
jtheir familiar names: Kate, Fred, Theo, Alice, Hetty, and
!
| Will or Willie, respectively.
i
4. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 60.
5. Freda Troup, South Africa: An Historical
Introduction (London: Penguin Books, 1975), p. 5.
6. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 79.
7. The exact date and the triggering event of her
first asthma attack are unclear; Olive herself gave
conflicting stories.
8. Although the novel was finished two years later,
Olive never thought it had much merit and did not try to
get it published. Her husband published it in 1927.
9. This book was also published posthumously by
Olive's husband with an ending he supplied. Professor
Ridley Beeton, University of South Africa in Pretoria,
|
I later discovered evidence that Olive had an entirely
!
different conclusion in mind. See Ridley Beeton, "The
Signals of Great Art? A Manuscript of Olive Schreiner's
!Unfinished Novel," Standpunte 145 33 (Feb. 1980), pp. 4-13.
i
j 10. Although Havelock Ellis knew all about Karl
I
: Pearson and unquestionably passed on the information to
I
Cronwright (with whom he worked in writing Olive's
biography), Cronwright not only deleted mention of the
affair but expunged all but the most impersonal references
to Pearson from her papers.
11. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 256. Cronwright later
chose to minimize the fact that, while they were married,
they were known as Mr. and Mrs. Schreiner. In a letter
written to either Kate or Hetty, Olive Schreiner wrote:
"My husband has taken my name, so we are Mr. and Mrs
Schreiner" (0. S. to "My dear old Sissie," 24 Feb. 1894,
Findlay family correspondence [Johannesburg: Dept, of
Historical Papers, Library, University of the Witwaters--
rand]. Also, after Olive’s death, Cronwright wrote
Havelock that he inform .the publisher of the biography
to use the hyphen so that his name read: "S. C. Cronwright-
Schreiner" (Cronwright to Ellis, 23 Feb. 1922, Cronwright-
Schreiner correspondence [Austin: University of Texas]).
12. 0. S. to Mrs. Jan Smuts, 24 Sept. 18 99, Olive
^ Schreiner correspondence (Cape Town: South African
j Library, University of Cape Town).
i
! 13. In his Olive Schreiner biography, Cronwright
j
i contends sharply that Olive never wrote a book on this
J
i subject, saying that what was destroyed in Johannesburg
jwere merely notes and jottings of no significance. Ruth
i
First and Ann Scott disagree, and evidence they present
from unpublished documentation substantiates Olive
Schreiner's claim (First and Scott, pp. 265-268).
14. The sobriquet, "Bible of the Women's Movement,"
; was later given Woman and Labour by Vera Brittain, suffra- j
i
jgette activist (Testament of Youth [London: VJ Gollansz,
| 1933] , p. 28) .
Notes to Chapter III
1. The name came into general use after the 1713
publication by Anthony Collin of Discourse of Freethinking,
Occasioned by the Rise and Growth of a Sect Called Free
thinkers. The movement took different forms in different
countries. The context in which the word "freethinking"
is used here was the one prevalent in England, where it
was associated with deism, as opposed to that of France,
where it connoted a complete break with traditional
Christianity (Columbia Encyclopedia, 3d. ed., s.v. "free
thinkers") .
I i
! 2. Cronwright-Schreiner, Life of Olive Schreiner,
pp. 219-220.
3. Cecil Northcutt, The Glorious Company (London:
Livingstone Press, 1945),. p. 38.
I
i
i 4. This is extrapolated from Olive Schreiner's
j
! fiction and descriptions of other missionaries' religious
: !
observances. There is no explicit description of the
: Schreiner religious activities.
i
| 5. Olive Schreiner, African Farm (Boston: Little,
Brown, & Co., 1939), p. 156. Although the book is fiction,!
j the section cited is autobiographical: "those little j
i t |
; child impressions in the chapter 'Time and Seasons' m :
i >
I ;
An African Farm are taken from those first six years I *
spent [in Wittebergen]" (0. S. to Cronwright, in Cronwright-
Schreiner, p. 246).
6. Schreiner, Undine (New York: Harper & Bros.,
1928), pp. 4-9.
7. Schreiner, African Farm, pp. 19-21.
8. Cronwright himself said, "I have no doubt that the
ticking watch (the ticking clock in Undine) and the
sacrifice are doubtless incidents that actually happened
to Olive herself" (Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 148).
9* See note 8, above.
10. Schreiner, African Farm, pp. 21-26.
11. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 67.
12. Ibid.
13. Ibid..., p. 69.
14. Cronwright-Schreiner, ed., The Letters of Olive
Schreiner: 1878-1920 (Boston: Little, Brown, 1924),
p. 274.
15. Cronwright-Schreiner, Life of Olive Schreiner,
| P. 70.
i
16. When Olive told Cronwright about Willie Bertram,
. whom she met when she was 16, "he was the only avowed
Freethinker she had, up t'o that time, ever met" (Cron
wright-Schreiner, Life, p. 81).
17. Although Olive constantly referred to dreadful
"persecution" by Theo and Hetty, a review of the family
!correspondence showed that, while the harrassment went on
for a while, its severity eased considerably after 187 0.
18. Cronwright-Schreiner, Life, p. 77.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.-, p. 86 .
21. Ibid., p. 97.
22. "Notes," Ellis memoranda of conversations with
O. S., 8 June 1884 [but undoubtedly taken over a period of
time] (Austin: Humanities Research Center, University of
Texas).
23. Cronwright-Schreiner, Life, p. 136.
24. Schreiner's latest biographers, First and Scott,
speculate about the effect this rejection had on Olive
Schreiner's poor self-image (First and Scott, p. 79). j
25. Freda Troup, South Africa: An Historical Intro-
duction (London: Penguin Books, 197 5), p. 95.
i
| 26. This does not necessarily mean that Olive was
| unaware of the missionary activity. It may be that
involvement was so routine that there was no reason to
I
mention it.
; 4
, 27. Cronwright-Schreiner, Life, p. 14. At the time j
i m t m I
she used the term "nigger," it did not have the pejorative j
* connotations it later assumed. j
28. Ibid., p . 13. !
29. Ruth First and Ann Scott mentioned that Rebecca i
instructed children in the mission school in 1837 (First
and Scott, p. 35), although authority for this statement
was not cited. If true, it is the first record of the
fact. Until reading the item, I had concluded that
Rebecca's illnesses, pregnancies and temperament precluded
her from any active role in her husband's missionary
activity.
Notes to Chapter IV
1. Olive Schreiner, Afrioan Farm (Boston: Little,
Brown, 1939), pp. 214-228.
2. Ibid., pp. 223-224.
3. Ibid., p. 223.
4. Ibid., p . 225.
5. Ibid., p. 228
6. Irene Fletcher, "Olive's Parents, Gottlob and
Rebecca Schreiner," in Zelda Friedlander, ed., Until the
Heart Changes: A Garland for Olive Schreiner (Cape Town:
Tafelbert-Uitgewers, 1967), p. 49.
7. S. C. Cronwright-Schreiner, Life of Olive
Schreiner, p. 2. According to Prof. Roberto Michel of the •
: Basel Seminary: "Gottlob Schreiner never matriculated in
i
! the Faculty of Theology. It seems he did not have the
sufficient culture for being a student in the narrow sense
of the word."
i
8. Cecil Northcott, Glorious Company (London: j
Livingstone Press, 1945), p. 36.
9. Cronwright-Schreiner, pp. 13-14. ]
i ' :
10. Ruth First and Ann Scott, Olive Schreiner J
(New York: Schocken Books, 1980), p. 43. In fact, they !
I
I
imply that, in order to supplement his salary to educate !
the boys, Gottlob began to engage in the trade with the j
I
j
i
‘natives which led to his eventual dismissal.
11. Joan Findlay, ed., The Findlay Letters, 1806-1870
{Pretoria: van Schaik, 1954), p. 124.
12. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 87.
13. Olive Schreiner, Undine (New York: Harper &
Bros., 1928), pp. 245-246.
14. Hetty told Kate that the reason she, Olive and
Willie went to stay with Theo was because their mother
!had insisted. Gottlob wanted the children to stay but he
I finally had to give in (Hetty Schreiner to Kate Findlay,
j
;15 Oct. 1876, Findlay family correspondence [Johannesburg:
: University of the Witwatersrand]).
|
1 15. In the only two cases of corporal punishment
: Olive remembered, both were administered by her mother.
16. "His wife did not fully respond to his love.
„ When she was away, he would talk to his children and be
i with them like a child" (Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 21).
| 17. Schreiner, African Farm, pp. 39-101, passim.
I
i 18. This picture was drawn from the letters in Joan
' Findlay's The Findlay Letters.
19. See Schreiner, Undine, pp. 43-47.
20. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 92.
21. Schreiner/ African Farm, p. 225.
22. Ibid., pp. 230-231.
i ’ 23. Edna O. Hellerstein et al. eds., Victorian
j Women (Stanford: University Press, 1981), p. 281.
24. In a letter to her mother, Olive described the
jdetails of her work day (Cronwright-Schreiner, pp. 99-100).
25. "Notes," Ellis memoranda of conversations with
O. S., 8 June 1884 (Austin: Humanities Research Center,
University of Texas).
26. Schreiner, African Farm, p. 231.
27. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 97.
28. As s h e wrote Mary Brown: "It was to me so
wonderful to see you cry such bitter tears because you
! were leaving your husband to whom you had already been
I
^married for over five years" (Cronwright.-Schreiner, pp.
i
' 96-97).
29. Dr. Brown was a sprightly practitioner who
brought many advanced medical practices to the Cape. An
j early supporter of women's rights, he and his wife began
j
| their married life by reading John Stuart Mills' The
I Subjection of Women aloud together. Also, as an early
|
! cycle faddist, he was later given to wearing knicker-
i
J bockers, and in fact gave his wife a bicycle for her
48th birthday. See Angela James and Nina Hills, eds.,
Mrs. John Brown: 1847-1935 (London: John Murray, 1937).
— ------------------ r —
3 0. Ibid., p. 185.
! 31. Ibid., pp. 186-188.
, 32. Ibid., p. 188.
Notes to Chapter V
1. It should be noted that, with the exception of
the portion of Olive Schreiner's Ratel Hoek journal
deposited in the Humanities Research Center in Austin,
the originals of all journal entries published in The Life
of Olive Schreiner were destroyed by Cronwright after the
book was written (see note 9, Chapter I). Even though it
is thus likely that these journal entries were edited and
judgments in this chapter drawn, therefore, from selected
evidence; the conclusions still have probative value.
2. Ellis stated: "The Bible was her education: she
could repeat a great deal now— not from having learned it,
but from reading it as a child" ("Notes,". Ellis memoranda
of conversations with O. S., 8 June 1884 [Austin:
Humanities Research Center, University of Texas]).
3. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 88.
j 4. Ibid., p. 218.
5. Ibid,, p. 82
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
j 8. Ibid., p . 8 5.
!
| 9. Ibid., p. 89.
| 10. Citations for the books on this list are as
t
j follows (given in successive order, one for each date):
Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 82, p. 89, pp. 91-92, p. 98,
p. 115, pp. 119-120, p. 127, and pp. 130-131.
11. Ibid., p. 115.
12. Ibid., p. 116.
13. Ibid.
15. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 98. It is hard to
believe that Olive never read Emerson before she was nine
teen. Reverend Zadock Robinson mentioned that her mother
Rebecca, read it often in 1862 (Ibid., p. 7). It is
hardly, conceivable that the book would have been in the
Schreiner house without Olive having gotten hold of it.
Of course, it is possible that Mrs. Schreiner treasured
it and did not let anyone else read it.
j 16. Ibid., pp. 187-188.
; 17. "Notes," Ellis memoranda of conversations with
| 0. S., 8 June 188 4 (Austin: Humanities Research Center,
University of Texas).
18. Cronwright-Schreiner, p. 127.
19. Ibid., p. 139.
20. Ibid., p. 187.
21. Ibid., p. 189.
tsj
to
•
Ibid. , p. 127.
23. Ibid., p. 130.
I
f
Notes to Chapter VI
1. The exception, of course, was Mary Brown. She met
her. when she was eighteen and continued to correspond
with her for almost fifty years.
2. In 1909, Olive's stated views on the Native
Question were unequivocal: "I am of the opinion that . . .
no distinction of race or colour should be made between
South Africans. South Africa must be a free man’s country"
(Schreiner, Closer Union [London: A. C. Pifield, 1909],
p. 37) .
3. Dan Laurence, ed., Bernard Shaw: Collected
| Letters, 1-874-1897. (London: Max Reinhardt, 1965),
p. 281.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. WORKS CITED
Unpublished material;
Austin, Texas. Humanities Research Center, University of
Texas. S. C. Cronwright-Schreiner correspondence.
_____ . Havelock Ellis correspondence and "Notes."
_____ . Olive Schreiner correspondence and journal.
Cape Town. South African Library, University of Cape
Town. Olive Schreiner■correspondence.
{Johannesburg. Department of Historical Documents,
j
| University of the Witwatersrand. Findlay family
j Correspondence.
Published works;
Beeton, Ridley. "The Signals of Great Art? A Manuscript
j of Olive Schreiner’s Unfinished Novel," Standpunte 145
i
; 33 (Feb. 1960).
t
t
: Brittain, Vera. Testament of Youth: An Autobiographical
Study of the Years 1900-1925. London: V. Gollancz,
1933.
Buchanan-Gould, Vera. Not. Without Honour: The Life and
Writings of Olive Schreiner. London: Hutchinson,
[1948] .
Cronwright-Schreiner, S. C., ed. The Letters of Olive
Schreiner: 1878-1920. Boston: Little, Brown, 1924.
_____ . The Life of Olive Schreiner , Boston: Little,
Brown, 1924.
Dilke, Charles. Problems of Greater Britain. London:
Macmillan, 1890.
iFindlay, Joan, ed. The Findlay Letters, 1806-1870.
Pretoria: van Schaik, 1954.
j
First, Ruth, and Scott, Ann. Olive Schreiner. New York: j
Schocken Books, 198 0.
i
I
■ Friedlander, Zelda, ed. Until' the Heart Changes: A
I
j Garland for Olive Schreiner. Cape Town: Tafelbert-
i Uitgewers, 1967.
i
t Hallerstein, Erna, Hume, Leslie Parker, Offen, Karen, eds. j
> I
j Victorian Women: A Documentary Account of Women's I
j “
Lives in Nineteenth Century England, France, and the
!
j United States. Stanford: University Press, 1981. !
69
James, Angela and Hills, Nina, eds. Mrs. John Brown:
1847-1935. London: John Murray, 1937.
Laurence, Dan H., ed. Bernard Shaw: Collected Letters,
1874-1897. London: Max Reinhardt, 1965.
Massingham, H. W. M., ed. A Selection from the Writings of
H. W. Massingham. New York: Harcourt, Brace, [1925] .
Northcutt, Cecil. The Glorious Company: One Hundred and
Fifty Years Life and Work of the London Missionary
Society, 1785-1945. London: Livingstone Press, 194 5.
Schreiner, Olive. Closer Union: A Letter on the South
African Union and the Principles of Government.
London: A. C. Fifield, 1909.
Introduction to From Man to Man by S. C. Cron-
wright-Schreiner. New York: Harper f i Bros., 1927.
The Story of an African Farm. Rev. ed. Boston:
Little, Brown, 1939.
Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland. London:
! T. F. Unwin, 1897.
I i
t
I
I _____. Introduction to Undine by S. C. Cronwright-
Schreiner. New York: Harper & Bros., 1928.
!Troup, Freda. South Africa: An Historical Introduction.
London: Penguin Books, 197 5.
B. SECONDARY SOURCES
Andersson, Charles J. Note of Travel in South Africa.
London: Hurst and Blackett, 187 5.
Ausubel, Herman. The Late Victorians. An Anvil Original.
New York: D. Van Nostrand, 1955.
i
• Beeton, Ridley. "In Search of Olive Schreiner in Texas."
I
I Texas Quarterly 17 (1974):105-154.
t
i
t
I Bell, W. H. Somerset. Bygone Days: Being a Reminiscence
! of Pioneer Life in the Cape Colony and the Transvaal.
I London: H. F. & G. Witherby, 1933,
' Bennett, Arnold. The Savour of Life. London: Cassell,
i 1
| 1928.
i
I
; Bott, Alan J. This Was England. Garden City: Doubleday,
Doran, 1931.
Brent, Peter. The Edwardians. London: British Broad
casting Corp., 1972. <
Calder-Marshall, Arthur. Havelock Ellis. London: Rupert J
t
Hart-David, 1959. j
(Carpenter, Edward. My Days and Dreams; Being Auto
biographical Notes. London: Allen & Unwin, 1916.
Cary, Robert. Charter Royal. Cape Town: Howard Timmens,
1970.
Casalis, Eugene. My Life in Basutoland: A Story of
Missionary Enterprise in South Africa. 1905. Reprint
Cape Town: C. Struik, 1971.
Chapman, Raymond. The Victorian Debate: English Litera
ture & Society, 1831-1901. London: Weidenfeld &
Nicolson, 1968.
j
jChesterton, G. H. The Victorian Age in Literature. 1913.
i Reprint. Cambridge: Oxford University Press, 1946.
j
| Churchill, R. C. English Literature of the Nineteenth
| Century. London: University Tutorial Press, 1951.
■ Cohen, Louis. Reminiscences of Kimberly. London:
Bennett, 1911.
Colby, Vineta. The Singular Anomaly: Women Novelists of
1 the Nineteenth Century. London: University of
j London Press, 197 0.
i
i
j Collier, Price. England and the English, From an American
; Point of View. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,
1913.
72
Cruse, Amy. After the Victorians. London: George Allen
and T. F. Unwin, 1938.
_____ . The Victorians and their Reading. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin, 1935.
Dell, Floyd. Women as World Builders: Studies in
Femininity. Chicago: Forbes, 1913.
Du Plessis, J. A History of Christian Missions in South
Africa. 1911. Reprint. Cape Town: C. Struik, 1965.
Ellis, Havelock. My Life. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1931.
Gloag, John. Victorian Comfort: A Social History of
i Design from- 1830-1900. London: Adam & Charles Black j
j 1961. |
Haldane, Elizabeth. From One Century to Another: The J
Reminiscences of Elizabeth S. Haldane. London: j
I Alexander Maclehose, 1937.
! !
! . j
Harris, Frank. Contemporary Portraits. 4th Series.
+ !
London: Grant Richards, 1924. j
I
: Hart, Roger. English Life in the Nineteenth Century. |
New York: G. P. Putnam!s Sons, 1971.
I
i i
Horne, C. Silvester. The Story of the L.M.S.: 1970-18 95. ,
London: John Snow, 1894.
Houghton, Walter E. The Victorian Frame of Mind, 133 0-
*
1870. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957.
Jackson, Holbrook. The Eighteen Nineties: A Review of
Art and Ideas at the Close of the Nineteenth Century.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1927.
Kingsmill, Hugh. After Puritanism. London: Buckworth
Georgian Library, 1929.
I
I
Lawrence, Margaret. The School of Femininity: A Book for
and about Women as They Are Interpreted through
i
Feminine Writers of Yesterday and Today. New York: !
Frederick A. Stokes, 1936. . i
i
i
; § I
Lessing, Doris. A Small Personal Voice: Essays, Reviews,
i
Interviews. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974. j
I
|
i
! Lockhart, John G., and Woodhouse, C. M. Cecil Rhodes: The
J Colossus of Southern Africa. New York: Macmillan,
! 1963.
»
i
Lockhead, Marion. The Victorian Household. London: ,
John Murray, 1964. i
1
i ;
Lovett, Richard. History of the London Missionary Society,;
1795-18 95. London: Oxford University Press Ware.*. i
i
house, 18 99. 1
Lowndes, E. E. K. Every-Day Life in South Africa. London:
S. W. Partridge, 1900.
Mackenzie, W. Douglas. John Mackenzie: South African
Missionary and Statesman. London: Hodder & Strough-
ton, 1902.
McLeod, Alan Lindsay, ed. The Commonwealth Pen: An
Introduction to the Literature of the British Common
wealth. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1961.
MacNeil, J. G. Swift. What I have Seen and Heard. Boston:
Little, Brown, 19 25.
■ Mannin, Ethel. Rebel’s Ride: A Consideration of the
Revolt of the Individual. London: Hutchinson, 1964. j
! i
| i
| Mill, John Stuart. The Subjection of Women. 1869. {
j !
j Reprint. Cambridge, Mass.: Massachusetts Institute
| of Technology Press, 197 0.
Moffat, John S. The Lives of Robert and Mary Moffat.
London: T. F. Unwin, 1885.
Nathan, Manfred. South African Literature: A General
| Survey. Cape Town: J. C. Juta, 19 25.
Nevinson, Henry W. Changes and Chances. London: Nisbet, |
1923. !
. 7 5
New, William H. Among Worlds: An Introduction to Modern
Commonwealth and South African Fiction. Ontario:
Press Porcepic, 1975.
Noble, John. Descriptive Handbook of the Cape Colony: Its
Condition and Resources. Cape Town: J. C. Juta, 1875.
Orpen, Joseph M. Reminiscences of Life in South Africa
from 1846 to the Present. 1908. Reprint. Cape Town:
C. Struik, 1964,
Pethick-Lawrence, Emmeline. My Part in a Changing World.
I London: Gollancz, 1938.
I '
I
j Quennell, Marjorie and Quennell, C. H. B. A History of
Johannesburg Printing House, 1946.
i
RoWbotham, Sheila, and Weeks, Jeffrey. Socialism and the j
New Life: The Personal and Sexual Politics of Edward i
i
Carpenter and Havelock Ellis. London: Pluto Press, J
Everyday Things in England. Vol. 4. 1851-1914
London: B. T. Batsford, 1958
Rosenthal, Eric. Gold Bricks and Mortar. Johannesburg:
1977
Shorter, Clemept K. Victorian Literature: Sixty Years of :
Books and Book-men. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1897.
76
Stern/ Elizabeth G. Women in Gandhi's Life. New York:
Dodd, Mead, 1953.
Trollope, Anthony. South Africa. 2 vols., 1878. Reprint.
London: Dawsons of Pall Mall, 1968.
Tucker, Martin. A Survey of the Representative Modern
Novel in English About Africa. Reprint. Ann Arbor:
University of Michigan Microfilms, 1971.
Walker, Eric. History of' South Africa. London: Longmans,
Green, ‘ 19 28 .
!____ . W. P. Schreiner: A South African. London:
|
i Humphrey Milford, Oxford University Press, 1937.
I
; Walsh, William. A Manifold Voice: Studies in Commonwealth;
i
I Literature. London: Chatto and Windus, 1970.
i
Webb, Beatrice. My Apprenticeship. London: Longmens,
Green, 1936.
Wellington, Amy. Women Have Told: Studies in the Feminist.
Tradition. Boston: Little, Brown, 193 0. j
i T
; J
■ Wollstonecraft, Mary. A Vindication of the Rights of i
| i
; Women. 1792. Reprint. New York: W. W. Norton, J
! I
1967. !
C. WORKS BY OLIVE SCHREINER (Original book publication
dates). Included in this listing are works already
cited in Section A.
Closer Union: A Letter on the South African Union and the
Principles of Government. London: A. C. Fifield,
1909.
Dreams. London: T. F. Unwin, 1890.
Dream Life and Real Life: A Little African Story. [Ralph
Iron, pseud.]. London: T. F. Unwin, 1893.
An English South African's View of the Situation: Words in
Season. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1899.
| The Political Situation. [Written with S. C. Cronwright-
i
! Schreiner]. London: T. F. Unwin, 1896.
I
I
i Stories, Dreams and Allegories. London: T. F. Unwin,
1923.
■ The Story of an African Farm. [Ralph Iron, pseud.].
!
| 2 vol. London: Chapman & Hall, 188 3.
1 Thoughts on South Africa. London: T. F. Unwin, 1923.
\ ~
! Undine. New York: Harper & Bros., 19 28.
!
j Woman and Labour. New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1911.
D. WORKS ABOUT OLIVE SCHREINER: BIOGRAPHY, BIBLIOGRAPHY,
SELECTIONS. Included in this listing are works already
cited in Section A.
Beeton, Ridley. Olive Schreiner: A Short Guide to her
Writings. Human Science Research Council Publications,
no. 51. Cape Town: Howard Timmins, 197 4.
Berkman, Joyce Avrech. Olive Schreiner: Feminism on the
Frontier. Monograph in Women's Studies. Montreal:
Eden Press Women's Publications, 197 9.
Buchanan-Gould, Vera. Now Without Honour: The Life and
Writings of Olive Schreiner. London: Hutchinson,
[1948] .
1 Cronwright-Schreiner, S. C., ed. The Letters of Olive
; Schreiner: 1878-1920. Boston: Little, Brown, 1924.
i
' . The Life of Olive Schreiner. Boston: Little,
i ----- ------------------------------
| Brown, 1924.
|
. Davis, Roslyn, comp., Olive Schreiner, 1920-1971: A j
I
Bibliography. Johannesburg: University of the !
I
Witwatersrand Press, 197 2. j
!
: First, Ruth, and Scott, Ann. Olive Schreiner. New York: !
i
j Shocken Books, 1980.
i
; Friedlander, Zelda, ed. Until the Heart Changes: A Gar-
land for Olive Schreiner. Cape Town: Tafelberg-
Uitgewers, 1967.
Friedman, Marion V. Olive Schreiner: A Study in Latent:
Meanings. Johannesburg: University of. the Witwaters-
rand Press, 1954.
Gregg, Lyndall. Memories of Olive Schreiner. London:
W. & B. Chambers, 1957.
Hobman, D. L. Olive Schreiner: Her Friends and Times.
London: Watts, 1955.
I
jKriege, Uys, ed. Olive Schreiner: A Selection. London:
i
| Oxford University Press, 1968.
: ;
i
i ;
1 Meintjes, Johannes. Olive Schreiner: Portrait of a South ,
• African Woman. Johannesburg: Hugh Heartland, 1965.
i
Thurman, Howard, ed. A Track to the Water's Edge: The
i
Olive Schreiner Reader. New York: Harper & Row,
!
1 9 7 3 . i
i
Verster, Evelyn, comp., Olive Emilie Albertina Schreiner,
18 55-1920: Bibliography. Cape Town: University of
Cape Town Press, 1946.
i '
I [
80
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DRAZNIN, YAFFA
FORMATIVE INFLUENCES IN THE LIFE OF OLIVE SCHREINER, VICTORIAN
FEMINIST AND FREETHINKER
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA M.A. 1982
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Creator Draznin, Yaffa (author)

Core Title Formative influences in the life of Olive Schreiner, Victorian feminist and freethinkier

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Degree Conferral Date 1982-05

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

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