Olive Schreiner
Olive Schreiner (1855-1920)
The Story of an African Farm
South African
Realism
Olive Schreiner, a South African writer and activist, is best known for her work to advance women’s rights and political independence for South Africa. As a writer, she is best known for her 1883 novel, The Story of an African Farm, and for a later work, Woman and Labour (1911), which became a seminal work of the Woman’s Movement, asserting the need for women to be engaged in meaningful work. Schreiner was the daughter of English missionary parents in South Africa. Her father, an unsuccessful missionary, was also an ineffectual businessman, so the family lived in abject poverty for most of Schreiner’s life. Always an intellectually curious child and a religious skeptic, the turning point in Schreiner’s life was her reading of Herbert Spencer’s First Principles, which reinforced her rejection of organized religion. After working as a governess for a number of employers, Schreiner travelled to England in 1881 to study medicine. However, her ill health—she suffered all of her life from acute asthma—prevented her working as a nurse, so she reconciled herself to working as a full-time writer, a profession she pursued for the rest of her life.
Upon its publication in 1883, The Story of an African Farm (1833) became an immediate sensation with readers in both England and America. Readers were fascinated by its experimental form, which included allegorical and dream sequences, a sexually active feminist protagonist, and an account of life in an exotic colonial setting. The novel’s themes range from bold feminist statements about the oppression of women, gender ambivalence on the part of a male character who finds fulfillment in dressing as a woman, frank discussions of sex, and an examination of religious agnosticism.
Consider while reading:
- What is the effect of the opening descriptions? Which features of the environment seem to be emphasized?
- Contrast Waldo, Lyndall, and Em. How would you characterize each of the children?
- How are the aboriginal peoples (the Bushmen) and colonized peoples (“Kaffirs” and “Hottentots”) represented? Are these representations consistent with Schreiner’s later advocacy for the equality and independence of African peoples?
Written by Anita Turlington