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    Dream Life and Real Life - A Little African Story
    Dream Life and Real Life - A Little African Story
    Dream Life and Real Life - A Little African Story
    Ebook38 pages29 minutes

    Dream Life and Real Life - A Little African Story

    By Olive Schreiner

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    About this ebook

    Originally published in 1893, "Dream Life and Real Life - a Little African Story" is a short story that illuminates issues of ethnicity and gender through a tragic tale of a little girl that becomes enslaved by a family. Olive Schreiner (1855–1920) was a South African anti-war campaigner, intellectual, and author most famous for her highly-acclaimed novel “The Story of an African Farm” (1883), which deals with such issues as existential independence, agnosticism, individualism, and the empowerment of women. Other notable works by this author include: “Closer Union: a Letter on South African Union and the Principles of Government” (1909), and “Woman and Labour” (1911). Read & Co. Classics is proudly republishing this classic short story now in a new edition complete with a specially-commissioned new biography of the author.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRead Books Ltd.
    Release dateDec 12, 2014
    ISBN9781473397163
    Dream Life and Real Life - A Little African Story
    Author

    Olive Schreiner

    Olive Schreiner (1855-1920) was a South African political activist and writer. Born to a family of Wesleyan missionaries, Schreiner was educated by her mother. Forced to move frequently due to her father’s inability to maintain a job, Schreiner became familiar with the landscape of South Africa and the cultural and political tensions holding together its diverse population. In 1881, she travelled to England in order to pursue her dream of becoming a medical professional, but her chronic asthma and limited finances prevented her from completing her training. In 1883, she published her debut novel, The Story of an African Farm, under a pseudonym, launching a career as one of South Africa’s leading writers. Throughout her life, she advocated for political equality for South Africa’s marginalized groups, including Afrikaners, indigenous Africans, Jews, and Indians. Combining a deep understanding of Christian morality with an active interest in socialism and the women’s suffrage movement, Schreiner is recognized as a pioneering feminist and political activist who wrote unflinchingly on such subjects as the Boer War, British imperialism, and intersectionality.

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      Book preview

      Dream Life and Real Life - A Little African Story - Olive Schreiner

      1.png

      DREAM LIFE

      AND REAL LIFE

      A LITTLE AFRICAN STORY

      By

      OLIVE SCHREINER

      First published in 1893

      Copyright © 2020 Read & Co. Classics

      This edition is published by Read & Co. Classics,

      an imprint of Read & Co.

      This book is copyright and may not be reproduced or copied in any

      way without the express permission of the publisher in writing.

      British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

      A catalogue record for this book is available

      from the British Library.

      Read & Co. is part of Read Books Ltd.

      For more information visit

      www.readandcobooks.co.uk

      Dedication to

      My Brother Fred,

      For Whose Little School Magazine the First of

      These Tiny Stories—One of the First I Ever Made—

      was Written out Many Long Years Ago

      O. S.

      New College, Eastbourne,

      Sept. 29, 1893

      Contents

      Olive Schreiner

      I DREAM LIFE AND REAL LIFE; A LITTLE AFRICAN STORY

      II THE WOMAN’S ROSE

      III THE POLICY IN FAVOUR OF PROTECTION—

      Olive Schreiner

      Olive Schreiner was born on Wittebergen Reserve, Cape Colony (present-day Lesotho) in 1855. After finishing school, she found work as a governess and a schoolteacher, and during her free time began to work on a novel about her experiences in South Africa.

      When Schreiner had saved enough money, she travelled to Britain, hoping to become a doctor. She lived in London where she began attending lectures at the Medical School, as well as attending socialist meetings. Schreiner met the publisher George Meredith, who in 1883 published her best-known novel, Story of an African Farm. A commercial and critical success, it is now seen as a defining work of early feminism – as is her later work, Women and Labour (1911).

      Over the rest of her life, Schreiner made the acquaintance of a number of figures in London society, including future Prime Minister William Gladstone. In 1889, she returned to South Africa to be with her family. Her brother, William Schreiner, later became prime minister of Cape Colony. Over the next few years she published two collections of short stories, Dreams (1891) and Dream Life and Real Life (1893). She also became heavily involved in politics, and was a fierce opponent of racism and imperialism. Her 1897 work Trooper Peter Halkett of Mashonaland (1897) was a strong attack on British rule in South Africa.

      At the outbreak of the First World

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