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Letter ReferenceHRC/CAT/OS/2a-iv
ArchiveHarry Ransom Center, University of Texas, Austin
Epistolary TypeLetter
Letter DateTuesday 5 August 1884
Address FromBuxton, Derbyshire
Address To24 Thornsett Road, South Penge Park, London
Who ToHavelock Ellis
Other VersionsCronwright-Schreiner 1924: 38; Draznin 1992: 122-3
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 an associated envelope and its postmark, which also provides the address it was sent to. Upside down on the bottom of the second side of paper and crossed out is 'Pavilion St Buxton'.
1Buxton
2Tuesday Night
3
4Sweet, I am soon going to bed very tired. We went for a drive this
5morning to a place called the “Cat-&-Fiddle.” I must go to it with
6you. It is the first ^& only^ place I have seen in England that gives
7one that feeling – the feeling we both miss so here. It is a bare
8wild mountain top 2000 feet above the see. You have that sense of
9solitude even though there are many pl people near you. This afternoon
10we went for a walk to Miller’s Dale. That too is beautiful, but it
11is the English “beautiful,” not ours. You know Wirksworth isn’t
12beautiful a bit compared to this part of Derbyshire it is quite ugly &
13common.
14
15I am not quite sure if Wilfred will go on Monday, but I think so. I
16took your letter with me & I read it at the “Cat & Fiddle.” & this
17afternoon at Miller’s Dale. I must get that article in the
18Nineteenth. I like Seely so. Now he is a man to whom I feel “a-kin.
19” That is something quite different from merely admiring a writer,
20very much admiring him. I always feel (did from the first moment I
21opened his book) akin to Emerson.
22
23I never read now, never touch a book You can’t think in what a
24completely stupefied state of mind I am. I can’t even make stories
25to myself after I go to bed. Tomorrow we are going to the Valley of
26the Goyte. ?I ?want ?might Goodnight my brother. How nicely I will
27rest when I know you are sleeping in a room not far off
28
29Olive
30
31^I have such heaps of things about Eleanor Dr. A – & all sorts of
32things to talk about.^
33
34Your little comrade.
35Olive
36
Notation
Schreiner read many reviews and journals and her reference to an 'article in the Nineteenth' is a mistake, for Seeley's article appeared elsewhere. He published three linked articles on Goethe in as follows: John Seeley (1884) 'Goethe' Contemporary Review, August (pp.161-77), October (488-506) and November (pp.653-72) 1884. 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.