Sarah Goldblatt

Goldblatt was born on 25 December 1889 in London as the eldest of four children to David Nathan Goldblatt and Fanny Esther Smith. Her parents were German-speaking Jews from Russian Poland, who had emigrated to England shortly before her birth. Sarah had two brothers, and a sister, Rebecca. Her father, who was born in Radom, was educated in a yeshiva, but had also received secular education in Berlin and Warsaw and was known as an outspoken socialist and Yiddishist.[1] They arrived to South Africa in 1897.[2]

As a child, she already learned to speak German and English fluently. Her family emigrated to Cape Town in 1897, where she attended the St. Martini School on Queen Victoria Street, and helped her father's small printing business and bookstore[1] in Cape Town. Through private tuition in Cape Dutch with Mr. CJ van Rhijn and self-study, she later obtained the school completion certificate (skooleindsertifikaat) and after that, she qualified to work as a primary school teacher at Cape Town Training College in 1911 when she received the T3 certificate for primary education.

She started to work as a teacher for a year at Cape Town Commercial College and in 1912, she began teaching at the Commercial Evening School in Oudtshoorn. When she found out there was a vacancy in the newspaper Het Zuid-Westen,[1] which was edited by C.J. Langenhoven,[3] which she obtained and joined the editorial staff in September 1912; they ran this newspaper together until the beginning of 1915. It is at this time that the very close friendship between them started to be forged. At the time of her appointment, she was not yet fully fluent in Afrikaans, but she learned the language and soon shared Langenhoven's passion for it. The collapse of the ostrich markets and the outbreak of the First World War hurt the newspaper business, and due to financial difficulties, it ceased operations at the beginning of 1915. Goldblatt went back to teach at the Commercial Evening School in Oudtshoorn and on Wynands River in the Oudtshoorn district, and on weekends she returned to do typing work for Langenhoven.

In January 1916, she began to work as a teacher at the farm school in Leeublad in the George district. In the middle of 1917, she returned to Cape Town and later settled in Mowbray in a house she called Luluerai. From October 1917 to May 1918, she was the first woman part of the editorial staff of the Afrikaans journal Die Burger. At the same time, she began to work as an editor for C.J. Langenhoven's manuscripts at Die Burger and National Press. Due to financial constraints, Die Burger had to cut staff in 1918 and she was laid off, although she received a letter of recommendation from the editor, Dr. Daniël François Malan. After her term at Die Burger, she was involved in the founding of the financial company Die Suid-Afrikaanse Nasionale Trust en Assuransie Maatskappij Beperk (South African National Trust and Assurance Company Limited), which is today known as Sanlam and continued to teach in Afrikaans at Simonstad Primary School and East Park Primary School, and then for three terms at Tokai Public School, which later became Simon van der Stel Primary School. She subsequently taught Afrikaans at Retreat and then from January 1922 at the Cape Town Training College. Later, she taught at Central Girls High School in Roeland Street in Cape Town.

In 1924, she passed the matriculation examination and thereafter also obtained the Higher Primary Education Diploma with distinction and passed the highest Taalbon examination. At the same time, she also completed courses in Psychology, Biology, and Zoology and also studied further in German and Dutch. From 1940 to 1944, she worked at Brooklyn Primary School in Cape Town, and after her official retirement at the end of 1944, she continued teaching at the Herschel Girls' School, the Christian Brothers in Sea Point and the Training College for Kindergarten Teachers in Claremont. Throughout her career, she also gave private classes in Afrikaans to high school students, immigrants, diplomats, and Members of the South African Parliament at her home. As a teacher, she was known for her support of the development of the Afrikaans language and the introduction of this language as a medium of instruction for all classes. She served as a member of the South African Education Union and was a chairperson of the Cape branch of this association, and was also one of the founders of the Cape School Radio Service. In later years she focused on nursing education.

• Versamelde werke from C.J. Langenhoven (1933)
• Janus: A bilingual anthology / 'n Tweetalige bloemlesing (1962)