ENGLISH LANGUAGE xAND LITERATURE IN SOUTH AFRICA. lOr 



(b) A second point of difference is found in social conditions. 

 All the feudal or semi-feudal conditions of English village life 

 can only be dimly visioned here, and, ha})pily, the same is true of 

 most of the evils caused by the sweating, the overcrowding, the 

 moral degradation and the poverty of the larger English towns. 

 The poems of Crabbe and the works of Miss Austen and Mrs. (iaskell 

 cannot be read in their full meaning here, and Mrs. Browning's 

 Cry of ihe Cliildrcn is fortunately quite out of place here. 



We have not here, either, the feudal survival of the poor man's 

 reverence for a jieer. even for such a brewer or journalist mushroom- 

 peer as the one to whom Tennyson refers as 



■ This new-mack- lord, whose splendour plucks 

 The slavish hat Ironi the xillaj-er's head." 



(t) Thirdly, let us take aesthetic, emotional, religious differences 

 which result in a great gulf being fixed between Southampton and 

 Table Bay. Under this group I include all the English survivals 

 of " medisevalism " — ruined castles and abbeys, ancient cathedrals, 

 pictiu'es by the Old Masters, historical associations of places and 

 families, etc. The absence of such reminders of the brave days 

 of old, and of such means of helping the imagination is one of the 

 greatest losses of colonial life. 



Scott's novels, it is true, are popular in this country, but that 

 is because he, like Shakesj^eare, for the most part draws types of 

 human nature which will stand for ever because the}' are true to- 

 human nature in all places and times. Then, again, the adventures 

 recorded by Scott appeal to the colonial boy. Thus Scott triumphs 

 here in spite of his local colour, his media^valism and antiquarianism. 



Again, as regards the religious tone of mind, the colonist is very 

 different from the Homelander, especially from the Homelander 

 of the towns. In England religion is " morality tinged with more 

 or less emotion." l:)ut here the emotional side is very little developed. 

 It is because of this atrophy of the emotions in South Africa that 

 so many preachers, who come here with the reputation of being 

 mightil}- moving preachers in the English pulpit, fail wholly or 

 partially in their attempt to stir the individualistic and unhysterical 

 colonial. 



Again, no South African could ever write hymns such as the 

 Wesleys wrote, partly because the humility of the " poor worm " 

 wandering in a " vale of woe " does not appeal to the son of the 

 veld, to the son of the land " where the healing stillness lies," 

 and partly because the South African has not yet reached the 

 stage of introspective analysis. In fact, speaking generall3% I 

 fear that it will be a long time before we have a " nest of South 

 African singing birds " so far as Romantic Poetry is concerned. 

 The Romantic Movement was partly a Renascence of Wonder, 

 and wonder is not a South African trait, and partly an emotional 

 high-tide, and Emotion is not much in evidence here. 



I have attempted to sketch some of the difficulties which colonial 

 students have to overcome in trying to appreciate the beauties and 

 graces of English literature. 



How far, then, can these students be helped by artificial means ? 

 I would suggest (i) firstly, a closer union of the study of Literature 



