Class, imperialism and literary criticism: William Ngidi, John Colenso and Matthew Arnold

Journal of Southern African Studies

Volumn 23, Issue 2, 1997, Pages 219-241

  Guy, Jeff ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF KWAZULU NATAL   (South Africa)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0347093828     PISSN: 03057070     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/03057079708708534     Document Type: Article

References (74)

1. T. O. Ranger, 'Missionary Adaptation of African Religious Institutions: the Masasi Case', The Historical Study of African Religion, with Special Reference to East and Central Africa (London, 1972), p. 221.
2. This information is taken from the important article 'The Black Philosopher', and account of interview with Ngidi which took place probably in the early 1880s. It was transcribed in a manuscript book to be found in the Natal Archives Depot, Pietermaritzburg, Colenso collection, Box 126, Miscellaneous Letter Books III.
3. See J. Guy, 'An Accommodation of Patriarchs - Theophilus Shepstone and the System of Native Administration in Natal' (forthcoming).
4. The evidence on whether it was his biological father or not is contradictory.
5. This and the following quotations are from J.W. Colenso, 'William, the Kafir Teacher', The Mission Field, II (1857).
6. Thus the contribution of Ngidi to the following assessment by Clement Doke should be noted: Colenso was 'undoubtedly the outstanding figure in Zulu literary work at this period. His First Steps in Zulu is an admirable little grammatical study ... the wealth of idiomatic examples throughout greatly enhancing its value'.
7. The fact that he was said to have had a little English was for the bishop a disadvantage not a qualification (in fact Colenso was later to describe Ngidi as having no English).
8. KC [Campbell collection]: Colenso collection, File 4. Journal written by Miss Alice Mackenzie while at Bishopstowe, p. 25.
9. Mackenzie, 'Journal', typescript, pp. 8-9.
10. [J.W. Colenso]. Three Native Accounts of the Visit of the Bishop of Natal in September and October, 1859, to Umpande, King of the Zulus: with Explanatory Notes and a Literal Translation and a Glossary of all the Zulu Words Employed in the Same: designed for the use of students of the Zulu language. I have used the Third Edition. Printed by Magema, Mubi and Co. (Vause, Slatter, Pietermaritzburg, 1901).
11. J.W. Colenso, First Steps of the Zulu Mission (SPCK, London, 1860) reprinted in Ruth Edgecombe (ed), J.W. Colenso, Bringing Forth Light. Five Tracts on Bishop Colenso's Zulu Mission (University of Natal Press and Killie Campbell Africana Library, Pietermaritzburg and Durban, 1982).
12. J.W. Colenso, First Steps of the Zulu Mission (SPCK, London, 1860) reprinted in Ruth Edgecombe (ed), J.W. Colenso, Bringing Forth Light. Five Tracts on Bishop Colenso's Zulu Mission (University of Natal Press and Killie Campbell Africana Library, Pietermaritzburg and Durban, 1982).
13. J.W. Colenso, First Steps, p. 50.
14. Three Native Accounts. p. 147.
15. Ibid., p. 152.
16. Ibid., Ngidi's account, pp. 44-45: notes, p. 102: and Colenso's translation, pp. 159-160.
17. J.W. Colenso, First Steps, pp. 54-55.
18. Ibid., p. 51.
19. Ibid., pp. 59-60.
20. Ibid., p. 60.
21. Ibid., p. 99.
22. Ibid., p. 137.
23. Ibid., pp. 140-141.
24. J. W. Colenso, The Pentateuch and Book of Joshua Critically Examined (Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, & Green, London, 1862) I. p. vii.
25. Ibid., p. 5.
26. Ibid., p. xxiii.
27. Ibid., p. xxvi.
28. Ibid., p. xxiv.
29. Ibid., p. 40.
30. Ibid., pp. 61-62.
31. Ibid., p. 149.
32. Ibid., p. 149.
33. Ibid., p. 150.
34. The two most important essays on Colenso by Matthew Arnold are 'The Bishop and the Philosopher', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (January 1863), pp. 241-256 and 'Dr Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (February 1863), pp. 327-336. For Arnold's writing I have used the standard collection, R.H. Super (ed), The Complete Prose Works of Matthew Arnold, III, Lectures and Essays in Criticism (University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1962) together with F. Neiman (ed), Essays, Letters, and Reviews by Matthew Arnold (Cambridge, 1960). My citations in this paper are to the edition edited by Super. I have drawn heavily on the detailed annotations of both editors.
35. The two most important essays on Colenso by Matthew Arnold are 'The Bishop and the Philosopher', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (January 1863), pp. 241-256 and 'Dr Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (February 1863), pp. 327-336. For Arnold's writing I have used the standard collection, R.H. Super (ed), The Complete Prose Works of Matthew Arnold, III, Lectures and Essays in Criticism (University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1962) together with F. Neiman (ed), Essays, Letters, and Reviews by Matthew Arnold (Cambridge, 1960). My citations in this paper are to the edition edited by Super. I have drawn heavily on the detailed annotations of both editors.
36. The two most important essays on Colenso by Matthew Arnold are 'The Bishop and the Philosopher', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (January 1863), pp. 241-256 and 'Dr Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (February 1863), pp. 327-336. For Arnold's writing I have used the standard collection, R.H. Super (ed), The Complete Prose Works of Matthew Arnold, III, Lectures and Essays in Criticism (University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1962) together with F. Neiman (ed), Essays, Letters, and Reviews by Matthew Arnold (Cambridge, 1960). My citations in this paper are to the edition edited by Super. I have drawn heavily on the detailed annotations of both editors.
37. The two most important essays on Colenso by Matthew Arnold are 'The Bishop and the Philosopher', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (January 1863), pp. 241-256 and 'Dr Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church', Macmillan's Magazine, VII (February 1863), pp. 327-336. For Arnold's writing I have used the standard collection, R.H. Super (ed), The Complete Prose Works of Matthew Arnold, III, Lectures and Essays in Criticism (University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1962) together with F. Neiman (ed), Essays, Letters, and Reviews by Matthew Arnold (Cambridge, 1960). My citations in this paper are to the edition edited by Super. I have drawn heavily on the detailed annotations of both editors.
38. KC: Colenso collection. Colenso to Bleek, 4 January 1863.
39. Stefan Collini, 'Arnold', in Victorian Thinkers (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1993), p. 255.
40. Ibid., p. 205.
41. Ibid., 'Arnold', p. 255.
42. Ibid., 'Arnold', p. 256.
43. Arnold, 'The Bishop and the Philosopher', p. 40.
44. Ibid., p. 48. I have altered the layout slightly of this passage.
45. Ibid., p. 47.
46. Ibid., p. 41.
47. Ibid., p. 43.
48. Ibid., pp. 43-44. I should perhaps continue the quotation in case I am seen to be quoting out of context: 'The great mass of the human race have to be softened and humanised through their heart and imagination, before any soil can be found in them where knowledge may strike living roots'. Nonetheless I think the quotation in the body of the text stands on its own: the passage which follows seems to me to be more of a contradiction than a qualification. We should also note that it expresses a sentiment with which neither Ngidi nor Colenso would disagree: see Ngidi's statement above where he says the missionary should preach carefully, 'saying here a little and there a little until his teaching has sunk down like soft rain into their hearts'.
49. Editorial Introduction to 'Dr Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church', in Neiman (ed), Essays, Letters, and Reviews by Matthew Arnold.
50. See Arnold, 'The Function of Criticism in the Present Time', pp. 276-279 where the attack on Colenso is continued - extended now to some of those who defended him like Frances Power Cobbe - but it is an attack of very different kind from that made in the initial articles. See n.1: 'It has been said I make it "a crime against literary criticism and the higher culture to attempt to inform the ignorant". Need I point out that the ignorant are not informed by being confirmed in a confusion?'
51. Super, Critical and Explanatory Notes, p. 417.
52. Ibid., p. 403.
53. Arnold, 'The Function of Criticism', pp. 276, n.1.
54. Ibid., Textual notes, p. 537.
55. Ibid., 'The Function of Criticism', pp. 277-278.
56. Ibid., 'The Function of Criticism', pp. 277-278.
57. Matthew Arnold, 'God and the Bible', in Super (ed), The Complete Prose Works of Matthew Arnold, p. 147. See also Matthew Arnold in J. Dover Wilson (ed), Culture and Anarchy (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1963), p. 181.
58. Matthew Arnold, 'God and the Bible', in Super (ed), The Complete Prose Works of Matthew Arnold, p. 147. See also Matthew Arnold in J. Dover Wilson (ed), Culture and Anarchy (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1963), p. 181.
59. Collini, 'Arnold', p. 256. In J. Guy, The Heretic. A Study of the Life of John William Colenso, 1814-1883 (Ravan and University of Natal Press, Johannesburg and Pietermaritzburg, 1983), p. 174 I give other examples of such attitudes to Colenso. I have chosen this article from Victorian Thinkers only to demonstrate a recent example of the pervasiveness of such dismissals of Colenso.
60. Collini, 'Arnold', p. 256. In J. Guy, The Heretic. A Study of the Life of John William Colenso, 1814-1883 (Ravan and University of Natal Press, Johannesburg and Pietermaritzburg, 1983), p. 174 I give other examples of such attitudes to Colenso. I have chosen this article from Victorian Thinkers only to demonstrate a recent example of the pervasiveness of such dismissals of Colenso.
61. Quoted in Collini, 'Arnold', p. 315. I have not yet been able to track this quotation to its source.
62. Terry Eagleton, Literary Theory. An Introduction (Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1983), pp. 22-23. Eagleton does not refer to Colenso specifically in this passage, but does in his earlier book Criticism and Ideology. A Study in Marxist Literary Theory (Verso, London, 1976), pp. 109-110.
63. Terry Eagleton, Literary Theory. An Introduction (Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1983), pp. 22-23. Eagleton does not refer to Colenso specifically in this passage, but does in his earlier book Criticism and Ideology. A Study in Marxist Literary Theory (Verso, London, 1976), pp. 109-110.
64. Owen Chadwick, The Victorian Church (London, 1970), vol II, p. 91.
65. KC: Colenso Collection, file 31, Longmans, Green & Co to Frank Colenso, March 1884.
66. Arnold, 'Dr Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church', p. 77. Arnold opened the article with the sentence, 'Here is a book on religious matters, which, meant for all the world to read, fulfils the indispensable duty of edifying at the same time that it informs'.
67. Quoted by Super in Lectures and Essays, Critical and Explanatory Notes, p. 426.
68. Arnold, 'Dr Stanley's Lectures on the Jewish Church', p. 78.
69. Sidney Coulling, Matthew Arnold and his Critics: A Study of Arnold's Controversies (Athens, Ohio, 1974), p. 125.
70. Ibid., p. 109.
71. J.W. Colenso, First Lessons in Science Designed for the Use of Children and Adult Natives (Printed at the Industrial Training Institution, Ekukanyeni, Natal, 1861).
72. Arnold, 'The Bishop and the Philosopher , pp. 47-48.
73. Natal, Native Affairs Commission Report and Proceedings, question 62, p. 162.
74. KC: Colenso collection. Letter from William Ngidi, 15 April 1883.