author

Arthur Shearly Cripps

1869–1952

An Anglican priest, poet, and activist, he spent much of his life in what is now Zimbabwe and became known for writing with unusual moral urgency about colonial injustice. His work brings together lyric feeling, religious conviction, and a fierce sympathy for people pushed to the margins.

2 Audiobooks

Cinderella in the South: Twenty-Five South African Tales

Cinderella in the South: Twenty-Five South African Tales

by Arthur Shearly Cripps

Primavera: Poems by Four Authors

Primavera: Poems by Four Authors

by Laurence Binyon, Arthur Shearly Cripps, Manmohan Ghose, Stephen Phillips

About the author

Born in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, in 1869, Arthur Shearly Cripps studied at Charterhouse and Trinity College, Oxford, before training for the Anglican priesthood. He first served in England, but around 1901 he left for Mashonaland in Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, where he would spend most of the rest of his life.

Cripps was not only a clergyman but also a poet, short story writer, and outspoken advocate for African communities living under colonial rule. Sources consistently describe him as someone who challenged powerful interests over land and justice, and that moral seriousness runs through the reputation he left behind.

He died in 1952. For readers today, his work stands out less for literary fashion than for its unusual mix of spiritual intensity, compassion, and resistance to the injustices of his time.