Essay --

The Boer War has been the focus of a considerable bole of fiction numbering everywhere deuce hundred novels and at to the lowest degree fifty short stories in English, Afrikaans, French, German Dutch, Swedish and even Urdu if we think the translation of rider Haggards Jess in 1923.For the social and literary historian it provides over a hundred year record of the relationship between books and history.The vast majority of novels and short stories about the Anglo-Boer involution were print around the time of the war and reflect the values and attitudes to British imperialism. Some of the titles make then give a fairly accurate impression of the jingoistic fervour which found its way into print B. Ronan, The Passing of the Boer (1899) E. Ames, The Tremendous Twins, or How the Boers were Beaten (1900) C.D. Haskim, For the Queen in South Africa (1900) F. Russell, The Boers Blunder (1900) H. Nisbet, For Right and England (1900) and The conglomerate Makers (1900). Among the mor e notable literary figures of the day who were closely associated with the events of the AngloBoer conflict were Rudyard Kipling (18651936) Winston Churchill (18741965) H. Rider Haggard (18561925) Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (18591930) Sir Percy Fitzpatrick (18621931) Edgar Wallace (18751932) and John Buchan (18751940)).Some of the most interesting names associated with satirising the AngloBoer conflict include H.H. Munro (Saki) (Alice in Pall Mall, 1900) G.K. Chesterton (The Napoleon of Nottinghill, 1904), Hilaire Belloc (Mr Clutterbucks Election, 1908) and Kipling Fables for the Staff, published in The Friend in 1900 in which he lampooned the incompetence of the British general staff. Douglas Blackburns A Burgher Quixote (1903) is one of the most unde... ...any Boers from the Cape, and freshr the two republics, who joined the National Scouts and fought for the British, but there were many Cape Boers who joined the commandos. This aspect of the war produced some of its finest respons es in fiction, for example Herman Charles Bosmans short stories The Traitors wife and The Affair at Ysterspruit, and Louis C. Leipoldts novel Stormwrack (1980). The question of divided loyalties is a outsize issue in Boer War fiction.Nor did the conflict end with the war. As late as 1980 a successful Australian film Breaker Morant was found on Kenneth Rosss play and Kit Dentons novel The Breaker (1973).The Boer War has move to be a popular subject for escapist fiction. Whereas the writers at the cover of the Empire were overwhelmingly British, with the decline of imperialism the field is now dominated by South African writers