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Letter ReferenceOlive Schreiner: Mimmie Murray 2001.24/10
ArchiveNational English Literary Museum, Grahamstown
Epistolary TypeLetter
Letter Date19 January 1909
Address FromHotel Milner, Matjesfontein, Western Cape
Address To
Who ToMinnie or Mimmie Murray nee Parkes
Other Versions
PermissionsPlease read before using or citing this transcription
Legend
The Project is grateful to the National English Literary Museum (NELM) for kindly allowing us to transcribe this Olive Schreiner letter, which is part of its Manuscript Collections. This letter is written on printed headed notepaper.
1 Hotel Milner
2 Matjiesfontein
3 Cape Colony
4 Jan 19/09
5
6 Dear Mrs Murray
7
8 I was so glad to get your letter with its valuable news. I should have
9answered it at once, but I have been ill for a long time with my heart
10& have now come here for a change from De Aar.
11
12 I hope your branch grows: it is on small branches to educate our women,
13 being started all over the country that the success of our work in
14South Africa depends. I hear Mrs Saul Solomon is coming out next month;
15 she is deeply interest in Woman's Suffrage & has been working hard
16for it in England, & I hope she will put new life into the work in
17Cape Town, which needs it.
18
19 Have you read a book called The Convert by Elizabeth Robins? It is on
20^about^ the suffragette movement in London. Real women & men are brought
21in, but there is also a mere story ^part^, which I think touches the
22question very near its root. If it were only a vote we wanted, perhaps
23those people would be quite right who say it is not worth suffering &
24going to prison for, or even dying, if that were necessary. Its
25because the vote means so much more; because of the great questions of
26sex & of social life lying behind that it is worth all the sacrifice
27we can make.
28
29 I am enclosing you a very beautiful letter I have had from a dear
30friend of mine Lady Constance Lytton a daughter of the Earl of Lytton
31the writer & a niece of Lady Locks who once lived at the Cape. Please
32return it me
. She was at first very much opposed to the suffragettes
33but is now one of their leading workers. She is one of the noblest &
34most beautiful women both in mind & body that I ever met.
35
36 All success to you in your work my dear friend.
37 Olive Schreiner
38
39 I have just had letters from my dear friends Miss Molteno & Miss
40Greene
who are now in Switzerland. I wish they would throw themselves
41into this work & come & help us. I have a feeling that one day they
42will. OS
43
44
45
Notation
The book referred to is Elizabeth Robins (1907) The Convert London: Methuen.