Schreiner, Olive

Schreiner, Olive (shrī`nər), pseud. Ralph Iron, 1855–1920, South African author and feminist, b. Wittebergen Reserve, Cape Colony. After several years as a governess, she went to England in 1881, taking with her the manuscript of her famous novel, The Story of an African Farm (1883). The novel, which has been likened to Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights, is an intense story of two children living in the African veldt; it was controversial because of its feminist and anti-Christian sentiments. Her later works included Dreams (1921), a collection of allegories; Women and Labour (1911); and a significant novel, unfinished, From Man to Man (1926). Her letters were edited (1924) by her husband, S. C. Cronwright-Schreiner, who also wrote her biography (1923, repr. 1973).

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Schreiner, Olive (Emilie Albertina)

(born March 24, 1855, Wittebergen, Cape Colony—died Dec. 11, 1920, Cape Town, S.Af.) South African writer. She had no formal education but read widely, developing a powerful intellect and militantly feminist and liberal views. After working as a governess she published (as Ralph Iron) the semiautobiographical The Story of an African Farm (1883). The first great South African novel, it concerns a girl living on an isolated farm in the veld who struggles to attain independence in the face of rigid Boer social conventions. Her later works include Trooper Peter Halkett of Mashonaland (1897), attacking Cecil Rhodes, and Woman and Labour (1911), an acclaimed bible of the women's movement.