Though better known for The Story of an African Farm (1883), a vivid description of provincial, stolid Boer (Afrikaner) society, Olive Schreiner also was the author of many shorter works of fiction. Both Dreams (1890) and Dream Life and Real Life: A Little African Story (1893) were published during her life; and Stories, Dreams and Allegories (1923), edited by her husband, appeared after her death in 1920, as did two other novels. These three slim collections contained eight short stories (two intended for children) and twenty-six dreams and allegories. Schreiner's novels and sometimes even her discursive prose also enclosed allegories or stories that interpreted or enhanced the surrounding narrative or argument, such as the allegory, separately printed in Dreams , of "The Hunter" (later 1870s or 1880) in The Story of an African Farm or "The Child's Day" (1888) in the posthumous From Man to Man; or, Perhaps Only ... (1926).

The first significant native writer of South...