"Only two questions in South Africa, rank confers duties" Read the full letter
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Letter ReferenceLetters/453
Archive
Epistolary Type
Letter Date30 September 1902
Address FromHanover, Northern Cape
Address To
Who ToAnna Purcell nee Cambier Faure
Other VersionsCronwright-Schreiner 1924: 233-4
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 Mrs. Anna Purcell.
2Hanover, 30th Sept.
3
4Why is it that beautiful things make one cry, and terrible things only
5turn one hard cold? The day in the Market Square here when they were
6sentencing our Hanover men to death, one felt as if one must burst
7into a loud hoarse laugh. What a truly magnificent thing that poem of
8Bertrand Shadwell's on De Wet is! The finest thing, viewed merely from
9the artistic standpoint, that has been written in the English language
10for over 20 years. When I read it the first time I began to cry at the
11second verse.
12