"Emily Hobhouse, Vrouemonument, funny story" Read the full letter
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Letter ReferenceKarl Pearson 840/4/3/29
ArchiveUniversity College London Library, Special Collections, UCL, London
Epistolary TypeLetter
Letter DateMonday 12 July 1886
Address FromThe Convent, Harrow, London
Address To
Who ToKarl Pearson
Other Versions
PermissionsPlease read before using or citing this transcription
Legend
The Project is grateful to University College London (UCL) and its Library Services for kindly allowing us to transcribe this Olive Schreiner letter, which is part of its Special Collections. The date has been written on this letter in an unknown hand. Schreiner was resident at the Convent in Harrow from mid May to the end of September 1886. The name of the addressee is indicated by content.
1 Monday
2
3 Please send the mother age evidence. I am ready to be convinced. If
4the Lord saves me it will be through works & not through faith – but
5I seek always to believe!
6
7 //I’m glad you see something in the paper. Mrs Walters will be
8delighted. She regards you as an ever flowing fountain of wisdom,
9light, & truth on the questions of woman, prostitution, marriage &
10childbearing. She never winds up a dissertation on these subjects to
11me without adding "but what does K.P. think?", "What is K.P.’s
12view?" It is quite useless for me to try & convince her that if you
13have any views ^on these subjects^ I am not in receipt of them.
14
15 Glorious to have another nephew! – this is mine. – Between
16yourself & him there is the most ridiculous likeness there ever was
17between a grown up man & a boy. Whenever your upper lip trembles I
18think you are going to ask me to tell you stories!
19
20 //We’ve had enough of "aesthetics." I’m taking the most keen
21enjoyment in a bunch of geraniums & two bright bound books just now.
22According to my theory I ought to be losing some higher pleasure in
23this merely sensuous pleasure; but I’m not aware that I am. On
24Thursday I’m coming in to spend the day with my Old Masters in the
25National Gallery.
26
27 //I am going to copy out all of my woman paper that is intelligible,
28for you to do what you like with. It’s only value is that it may
29suggest to you some woman’s fallacies to lay low.
30
31 Give me your address before you go that I can send it to you.
32
33 Olive Schreiner
34
35 I have never been into Town since the club, & only three times been
36out of the grounds since last I saw you. The Rev. Mother says she is
37sure I shall be a nun some day!
38
39 ^You will send me your book?^
40
41 ^The pamphlet sent is from Mrs Walters who specially asked me to send
42it you. There’s nothing new or interesting in it.^
43
44
45
Notation
'Mrs Walter's paper' is E. M. Walters' 'What Hope?', responding to Henrietta Muller's 'The Other Side of the Question', read at the Men and Women's Club in November 1885. The book which Schreiner asks for is perhaps Pearson's (1886) Matter and Soul London: Sunday Lecture Series. The pamphlet sent by Mrs Walters referred to in the final insertion cannot be established.