"Detailed advice for nursing Will Schreiner just before his death" Read the full letter
Collection Summary | View All |  Arrange By:
< Prev |
Viewing Item
of 586 | Next >
Letter ReferenceHRC/UNCAT/OS-39
ArchiveHarry Ransom Center, University of Texas, Austin
Epistolary TypeLetter
Letter DateTuesday 24 March 1885
Address From4 Robertson Terrace, Hastings, East Sussex
Address To
Who ToHavelock Ellis
Other VersionsCronwright-Schreiner 1924: 66; Draznin 1992: 326-7
PermissionsPlease read before using or citing this transcription
Legend
The Project is grateful to the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, the University of Texas at Austin, for kindly allowing us to transcribe this Olive Schreiner letter, which is part of its Manuscript Collections. This letter has been dated by reference to information written onto it by Ellis. Schreiner was resident at two addresses in Hastings from the end of November 1884 to the end of April 1885.
1Tuesday
2Evening
3
4Last night after it came I took my Shelly to bed & slept with it. You
5know there is such a funny little thing – your & I are somehow one
6– in your my Shelly that that I had at Ganna Hoek & Lily Koof &
7loved so & read a whole year every day, under the poem of the skylark,
8I drew little lines with a pencil to show where the accent came! I
9couldn’t believe it when I saw it in your’s too. Isn’t it funny.
10I do love it, Havelock.
11
12I liked your letter this morning. I was miserable & wanting to cry all
13day. I couldn’t work. I held myself in. If I once give way it may be
14weeks & months before I pull together. You ought to want me to be
15happy it’s such a dreadful thing for my brain when I give way. I’m
16going to take Bromide. but I don’t think it will do any good.
17
18The story of my heart is wretched. I would like to see that article of
19Morley’s.
20
21Your,
22Olive
23
24I shall take Shelley with me to bed tonight I didn’t know he was for
25me to keep
26
Notation
The book referred to is: Percy Byshe Shelley (1885) Alastor and Other Poems London: Reeves and Turner. Draznin's (1992) version of this letter is in some respects different from our transcription. Cronwright-Schreiner's (1924) extract is incorrect in various ways.