"Will Schreiner's political duty, difficulty of finding path of duty,' Peter Halket' & lay aside ambition" Read the full letter
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Letter ReferenceLetters/278
Archive
Epistolary Type
Letter Date10 April 1888
Address FromAlassio, Italy
Address To
Who ToHavelock Ellis
Other VersionsCronwright-Schreiner 1924: 134-5
PermissionsPlease read before using or citing this transcription
Legend
When Cronwright-Schreiner prepared The Letters of Olive Schreiner, with few exceptions he then destroyed her originals. However, some people gave him copies and kept the originals or demanded the return of these; and when actual Schreiner letters can be compared with his versions, his have omissions, distortions and bowdlerisations. Where Schreiner originals have survived, these will be found in the relevant collections across the OSLO website. There is however a residue of some 587 items in The Letters for which no originals are extant. They are included here for sake of completeness. However, their relationship to Schreiners actual letters cannot now be gauged, and so they should be read with caution for the reasons given.
1To Havelock Ellis.
2Alassio, 10th April.
3
4I'm so glad you are better. I'm not nearly so affectionate to you as I
5was! ... I've stuck fast in my work. I've been agonising over it but
6it won't come right. I've been praying over it; sometimes that helps.
7When I stand up from my knees things come clear. I pray a great deal
8over this work. Unless the Lord should help me I'll never get it done.
9And it'll be a damned poor little when it is done. It's wonderful what
10makes one work, what impulse drives one on. It's a sort of instinct,
11like what makes the bird make their nests. I'm going to pray some more
12by the sofa now. What else can I do when I don’t know what comes
13next? It's all about sex in the human race. … Can you meet me at
14Boulogne to go on to Venice, say 5th of May? Write and tell me all
15about yourself as soon as you are better.
16
Notation
The reference to ‘this work’ is to From Man to Man.