Resumen

GORELIK, Boris. Leo Tolstoy and Afrikaners: Their views of each other. Tydskr. geesteswet. [online]. 2024, vol.64, n.2, pp.315-333. ISSN 2224-7912.  http://dx.doi.org/10.17159/2224-7912/2024/v64n2a9.

Tolstoy'sfiction is part of the cultural background of the South African intelligentsia. Moreover, generations of South Africans have been introduced to Tolstoy through screen adaptations of hisfiction, including Hollywood blockbusters and acclaimed TV series such as Anna Karenina (1935, 1948 and 2012) and War and Peace (1956 and 2016). Such exposure may well be the reason why, in the late 1990s, a survey among South African students of their perceptions of Russia showed that Tolstoy was the best-known Russian writer. During his lifetime, Tolstoy's work and personality were discussed extensively in Russia and abroad, including South Africa. He was one of the most influential and authoritative writers in the world and remained the best-known Russian author in South Africa. Tolstoy was the only writer of Imperial Russia who, for decades, received letters and guests from South Africa. His statements on the Anglo-Boer War of1899-1902 (also known as the South African War) attracted international attention which none of his Russian colleagues could match. Tolstoy wrote on South Africa, and his work was widely read there. Thanks to his erudition, ability to discern global trends, and interest in world culture and philosophy, Tolstoy had a profound understanding of political events in countries that he never visited and inspired leaders of liberation movements that he never met. His influence on South African realist literature can be traced throughout the twentieth century. This study of Tolstoy's and South Africans' views of each other focuses on Afrikaners, because in the last ten years of his life the Russian author often wrote and spoke about them, as is evident from his published works, correspondence and the archival material in the Tolstoy museums in Moscow and Yasnaya Polyana in Russia that were used for this paper. Furthermore, Afrikaner authors seem to have referred to Tolstoy's work remarkably often. By exploring these references, one can ascertain why Tolstoy's writing remained relevant to Afrikaners and other South Africans for more than a century. In the 1890s and 1900s, Tolstoy continued to develop his doctrine of not resisting evil with violence. He used information on the Anglo-Boer War to test his radical pacifist ideas. His protest against British imperialism in Africa echoed that of other world-famous humanist writers, such as Bjornstjerne Bjornson, Theodore Dreiser, Anatole France, Romain Rolland, Bernard Shaw, Bertha von Suttner and Mark Twain. But, unlike most of them, Tolstoy refused to support the Boers unconditionally. He sympathised with the defenders of the Boer republics, but as a principled opponent ofviolence he condemned those Christian people for engaging in armed struggle and killing, which he regarded as a mortal sin. During the transitional and guerrilla phases of the war, Tolstoy came to regard the continued Boer resistance to British invasion as a triumph of moral strength over immorality. He viewed the South African military conflict in a global context, as a typical war of a new era. Reflecting on the news from South Africa, he concluded that such wars were characterised by immoral goals and methods of warfare, and by non-participation in hostilities by those who directly benefitted from the hostilities (big entrepreneurs manipulating the government). Tolstoy argued that European governments were not interested in eradicating militarism, but nonviolent protest by ordinary people could well put an end to war. However, Tolstoy believed Russians, unlike participants in mass pro-Boer campaigns, were not to concern themselves with such protest because instead their main tasks were moral self-improvement and tackling injustice in their homeland. His concern with affairs in South Africa was limited to the Anglo-Boer War and the Indian civil rights campaign of the 1900s led by Gandhi, whose doctrine of satyagraha was partly based on Tolstoy's ethical teachings. Still, Tolstoy's influence on Afrikaner culture has been evident for over a century. Apartfrom direct contact, such as visits and letters to the Russian writer, Afrikaner cultural figures promoted his work, translated his fiction into Afrikaans and published their translations in almost every decade up to the 1990s. Along with other distinguished novelists of the late Imperial Russia, Tolstoy was viewed by Afrikaans authors as an exemplary realist writer who set standards that they aspired to but often regarded as unattainable. It only applied to his fiction, because Tolstoy's confessional writings and philosophical treatises did not seem to be recognised by Afrikaans authors, especially not after the Second World War. For these authors, Tolstoy was primarily a fiction writer. Tolstoy's work featured in South African literary debates with regard to resistance to abusive state authority and grappled with censorship. His fiction reminded South Africans of the humanist ideals that were meant to guide those who wanted to bring about positive change in an unjust, deeply divided society. Tolstoy's work stimulated introspection and reflection on literary mastery, the ethical standards of a writer and one's purpose in life.

Palabras clave : Leo Tolstoy; South African War; Second Anglo-Boer War; pro-Boer movements; cross-cultural interactions; Russia and South Africa; Russian influence on South African literature.

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