There appear to have been a number of Dutch plays called Een Misverstand ("A misunderstanding") that have been performed in South Africa over the years.

Not to be confused with the musical piece Het Misverstand ("the misunderstanding") , or Het Misverstand, of Elk is Een Dief in Zijne Nering (Anon).

Een Misverstand, a one act comedy by the author of "Schrijver van Een Geschandvlekte Naam"

The original text

When performed in South Africa it was billed as being by "Schrijver van Een Geschandvlekte Naam", whom F.C.L. Bosman (1980) for some unnamed reason identifies as P. Faddegon, the local amateur and writer from Cape Town. However, he also mentions that, according to the Catalogus Nederlansche Toneel, Een Geschandvlekte Naam was a play in five acts by J. Schuitemaker (a playwright and publisher from Purmerend), a fact substantiated by the original text of the five act play as published by Schuitemaker in 1867.

If so, the one act play Een Misverstand could possibly be a local adaptation (and renaming) by Paddegon of Schuitemaker's one act comedy Oom en Neef, of Misverstand op Misverstand ("Uncle and Nephew, misunderstanding upon misunderstanding"), which was not an original play, but a free adaptation of a French piece, prepared for the Rederijkers in Holland (by Schuitemaker?) and published by G.T. Bom in Amsterdam in about 1872.

Translations and adaptations

Performance history in South Africa

1874: Performed as Een Misverstand by Aurora II in the Oddfellows Hall, Cape Town on 1 September, with Arthur de Beaumont, of De Franctireur van Neufville (Van der Stempel).

Sources

Facsimile version of the original text of Een Geschandvlekte Naam (1867), Google E-Book[1]

F.C.L. Bosman. 1980. Drama en Toneel in Suid-Afrika, Deel II, 1856-1916. Pretoria: J.L. van Schaik: p. 469,

Henk Nijkeuter. Geschiedenis van de Drentse literatuur, 1816-1956. Van Gorcum, 2003:p.207.[2]

Go to ESAT Bibliography

Een Misverstand is Dutch duologue for two ladies by Humorus

This is apparently an original Dutch duologue, published in Groningen by Van Dijk as no 86 in his series of texts.

The original text

Translations and adaptations

Performance history in South Africa

Sources

F.C.L. Bosman. 1980. Drama en Toneel in Suid-Afrika, Deel II, 1856-1916. Pretoria: J.L. van Schaik: pp. 469, 470

http://www.dbnl.org/arch/humo001misv01_01/pag/humo001misv01_01.pdf

Een Misverstand a Cape Dutch/Afrikaans one act play by G.P. du Toit

This is an early Afrikaans (or Cape Dutch) version of Turn Him Out, a farce in one act by Thomas John Williams (1824-1874), translated and adapted into Afrikaans by G.P. du Toit in 1898 as Een Misverstand ("A Misunderstanding").

Translations and adaptations

Performance history in South Africa

1898: Performed by the Gedenkschool der Hugenoten in Paarl on 10 December, as part of an "entertainement". L.W.B. Binge (1969, pp.27 and 43) maintains this was the first programme he could find of a performance in Afrikaans, though the programme listed it as a "Dutch Play". The author later assured him it had in fact been in Afrikaans.

1914: Performed on 28 September 1914 by the Debating Society of Nooitgedacht South in the Oudtshoorn district.