A PEASANT POETESS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5686, 3 October 1896, Page 3

A PEASANT POETESS.

A good deal of attention is being ! directed to the life - work of Jolian.ua Ainbrosius, tlio German peasant posters. Her sj-aall book of verses lias already, in twelve months, gono through nearly as many . editions. " Denied almost the least culture, goaded by constant poverty, this singer found poesy ia-tlio deep \volW.f her soul," -saySi pae} adinireni -iriie .has. «ai d somewhere : " He who, like myself, has sat at table with Want, and lias., drank, from the same cup. willi Misery, knows what , living means." Miss Ambrosius was born on August 3, 185-i, at Longv/ehhen, •«• small i village iv East Prussia.. She was the second child of 'a working man. As a little girl sbo went to the village school, but only until her eleventh year, when, her tima \v.is required for household work. Their mother was an invalid, and Johanna and her sister, while yet mere children, were called on to do all the work for the family— cooking, sweeping, washing-, and scrubbing. Their father, fortunately, was fond of books, and did what he could to make upAo the children for the advantages they were obliged to forego. As a great treat lie allowod them to take the Gartenlaube, ,a .weekly illustrated magazine, .and they were glad enough to deprive themselves of any other pleasure for the sako of thid literary luxury. For many years its pages seem to have been their only intellectual pasturage, and Johanna describes the unfailing delight of poring . over them after the hard day's work was done. As a young girl the., unfortutunate poetes3 went into service, but seems to have been very, unhappy, for she soon returned to her. home.- At twenty Johanna roamed a young peasant, by the name of Voight. "We are told nothing of her subsequent life beyond the fact that a son and a- daughter were born to the young couple, and that the struggle for existence was more strenuous than ever. " The joy's and sorrows of. motherhood," one critic says, "seem to wear a keener edge for her, sharpened as they are by the ever-present state of poverty and want. Yet the note of joy predominates when she thinks and writes of her children, and such a poem as 'Mein Bub' seems to have come from the heart of all happy mothers. It is this quality of universality which is go admirable in her verses."