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A Century of Anglo Boer War Stories
349 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
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July 10, 2022
Going into this collection of stories I was very ignorant of this conflict. To get going I did a quick visit to Wikipedia but that was about it. The book has left me with some feeling for the conflict.
The foreword was really good at setting the stage. I read this book because I wanted to read a 'war book'. I very much do not know if this is representative of a 'war-book', it was not quite what I expected. I expected more suspense, more glory, more combat, but the book had other things in store instead. This book is primarily written from the view of the colonizing powers, while the native supressed people are mostly just there as their servants.
The stories all have different perspectives but there are definitely themes. Stories from the Boer side of things were more memorable I think. They portrayed a bleak struggle against the swarming British. The boer perspective also had a lot of nature focus, several stories told of great men in contact with nature, being able to talk with animals and such.
And as the foreword mentioned, the English stories more easily slips into less nationalism and more of a regret for the war. But what both side's stories seem to agree on 'the worst', the worst were the joiners.
The 'handsuppers', 'joiners', (National Scouts), where Boers who joined the British and fought against their own people. The wife of a joiner will defineatly give him up, I learnt that much. Often utilized as scouts as they know the land. On the other end were the 'bitterenders', people who never gave up, ever. There was one comical story on this subject where a bitterender simply refuses to take an English oath even long after peace has been settled. As such he inflicts bureaucratic damage upon the British.
The vocabulary in this book is sprinkled with words from Afrikaans and Dutch. I enjoyed that, I didn't look up 'mealie' and 'kraal' until I was almost done with the book. It felt enough to know that you could make mealie porridge and roasted mealie. My mind struggled a lot with 'the real' and 'the propagandic' when reading. I wanted to see more fates of real lives seeping through than I felt I did.
Some standout stories:
'Eighteen-ninety-nine' - A long depressing tale about watching all you sons being lost to war. A lot of the stories in the book was from the perspective of women. There was the forever waiting, the agnozing over the senseless waste of war, e.t.c. There was also stories of the concentration camps being set up for the Boer women and children, the conditions in those were painted as very abysmal.
'The shield of old Sem' - A story about a blind boy saving the day for the Boers. A bit cheesy perhaps, but honestly, quite delicious cheese. Dang, I cannot resist such a massive pity/underdog story.
'Miss Godby and the Magistrate' - Probably only remember it because it was the last story. I really could not take the side of the old lady in the end, her ramblings just read to much like a posh white lady thinking in black and white and not seeing her own entitlement to its full extent. This was a story which I felt did very well on the 'this is not just propaganda, this has history in it' front.
The stories were also a bit mixed in quality I think. I skipped a couple when they strained my patience a bit too much with their weird writing style ('A Sahib's war' come to mind.)
Overall interesting and worth a read if you want to remove a historical blindspot.
The foreword was really good at setting the stage. I read this book because I wanted to read a 'war book'. I very much do not know if this is representative of a 'war-book', it was not quite what I expected. I expected more suspense, more glory, more combat, but the book had other things in store instead. This book is primarily written from the view of the colonizing powers, while the native supressed people are mostly just there as their servants.
The stories all have different perspectives but there are definitely themes. Stories from the Boer side of things were more memorable I think. They portrayed a bleak struggle against the swarming British. The boer perspective also had a lot of nature focus, several stories told of great men in contact with nature, being able to talk with animals and such.
And as the foreword mentioned, the English stories more easily slips into less nationalism and more of a regret for the war. But what both side's stories seem to agree on 'the worst', the worst were the joiners.
The 'handsuppers', 'joiners', (National Scouts), where Boers who joined the British and fought against their own people. The wife of a joiner will defineatly give him up, I learnt that much. Often utilized as scouts as they know the land. On the other end were the 'bitterenders', people who never gave up, ever. There was one comical story on this subject where a bitterender simply refuses to take an English oath even long after peace has been settled. As such he inflicts bureaucratic damage upon the British.
The vocabulary in this book is sprinkled with words from Afrikaans and Dutch. I enjoyed that, I didn't look up 'mealie' and 'kraal' until I was almost done with the book. It felt enough to know that you could make mealie porridge and roasted mealie. My mind struggled a lot with 'the real' and 'the propagandic' when reading. I wanted to see more fates of real lives seeping through than I felt I did.
Some standout stories:
'Eighteen-ninety-nine' - A long depressing tale about watching all you sons being lost to war. A lot of the stories in the book was from the perspective of women. There was the forever waiting, the agnozing over the senseless waste of war, e.t.c. There was also stories of the concentration camps being set up for the Boer women and children, the conditions in those were painted as very abysmal.
'The shield of old Sem' - A story about a blind boy saving the day for the Boers. A bit cheesy perhaps, but honestly, quite delicious cheese. Dang, I cannot resist such a massive pity/underdog story.
'Miss Godby and the Magistrate' - Probably only remember it because it was the last story. I really could not take the side of the old lady in the end, her ramblings just read to much like a posh white lady thinking in black and white and not seeing her own entitlement to its full extent. This was a story which I felt did very well on the 'this is not just propaganda, this has history in it' front.
The stories were also a bit mixed in quality I think. I skipped a couple when they strained my patience a bit too much with their weird writing style ('A Sahib's war' come to mind.)
Overall interesting and worth a read if you want to remove a historical blindspot.
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