The purpose of this thesis is to isolate and examine the major technical devices of the short stories of Katherine Mansfield. Since the emphasis will be on Mansfield's technical skill, not on the development of that skill, my discussion will be limited to the stories of Mansfield's major writing period, to the completed stories of Bliss. The Garden Party, and The Dove's Nest. The introductory first chapter gives a summary of the critical attention Mansfield's work has received, attention largely commendatory but generally lacking in specific examination of the stories themselves, and of the few statements Mansfield herself made on her artistic principles. From this starting point the stories themselves are examined as evidence of Mansfield's technique. For the purpose of this paper, I limit my discussion to what I believe are the major aspects of Mansfield's art of story writing: her use of time, of point of view, of names, and of symbolism. In Chapters II - V these techniques are examined separately in relation to the stories. Chapter VI summarizes the conclusions reached in previous chapters: that Mansfield's skill is a unique blend of several largely traditional techniques. A brief discussion is given of the problem of Mansfield's unwritten work, work she hoped to do but was prevented from attempting by her early death. The report of a conversation with Mansfield a few weeks before her death is cited as evidence that Mansfield had come to recognize the emotional flaw in much of her earlier work. The conclusion reached is that, if indeed Mansfield had succeeded in widening her view of life, she would have been able to produce work of a very high literary standard since she had certainly attained a very high degree of technical skill. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / The aim of this dissertation is to examine Katherine Mansfield's achievement from a new perspective, the final phase of her life, the period of Fontainebleau. This period provides us with a framework for understanding her short stories because it serves to integrate her ideas and her fiction. By bringing her life and work much closer together than critics had previously done, I have shown that her decision to go to Fontainebleau is a natural evolution of her thought and not an abdication of reason. My interpretation has been substantiated with references to Katherine Mansfield's writing, with oral and written reports of people who knew her at the Prieure in Fontainebleau, and with all available scholarship. Since it was not possible to work with the original manuscripts and journals, the central focus of the dissertation is on the short stories, which Katherine Mansfield had the opportunity to edit before publication. Chapters One and Two deal with the major forces which influenced the author's life and the period of time she actually spent at the Prieure. The next four chapters trace her ideas prior to her decision to go to Fontainebleau. The material in the stories, journals, and letters is organized around four crucial experiences in Katherine Mansfield's life: expatriation, love fore John Middleton Murry, the death of her brother and her loss of health, the constant search for understanding. Chapter Three, "To Be a Stranger," considers the experience of isolation as it first appears in her early work, In a German Pension, and as it is treated in her later stories. In Chapter Four, "To Love and Marry," Katherine Mansfield's attitude toward love is studied in relationship to her life with John Middleton Murry. Chapter Five, "To Live and Be Well," traces the significance of the author's understanding of herself as the loss of her health results in a revaluation of her effort to live exclusively as a writer. Chapter Six, "'To Find the Snail Under the Leaf,'" explores the major motif of "the search" in the author's life and fiction. The final chapter of this book, "'To Laugh with the Heroes,'" measures the significance of Fontainebleau in terms of Katherine Mansfield's ideas about her future as an artist. This dissertation corrects two prevalent misapprehensions about Katherine Mansfield: the first, that the desperate state of her health reduced her grasp on reality to a condition bordering on absolute despair, and the second, that her significance as a writer should be based primarily upon her technical innovations. "The Way to Fontainebleau" demonstrates that a proper assessment of Katherine Mansfield's literary achievement cannot be made without understanding the significance of the period of Fontainebleau. / 2031-01-01

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1967. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Th. doct.--Lettres. / Notes bibliogr. Bibliogr. p. 266-280. Index.

by Xiang Liping. / Thesis (M.Ph.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1986 / Bibliography: leaves 172-181

Thesis (M.A.)--Victoria University of Wellington, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references.

Zugl.: Paderborn, Univ., Diss., 2009

A survey of the available literature on Katherine Mansfield has shown that, in the five decades which have elapsed since the author's death, critical interest has gradually, but significantly, altered its direction. Despite the workmanlike assessments of such critics as David Daiches in Britain and Andre Maurois in France, and the recognition of her mastery of the short story form by such fellow practitioners of the art as H.E. Bates and Elizabeth Bowen, the mainstream of criticism tended, in the first decades after the author's death, to centre less upon the characteristics of the work itself than upon a cult- like fascination, initiated, perhaps, by the perceptive but over-interested pen of Middleton Murry. Only more recently has this tendency been superseded by a more rigorous scrutiny of the stories themselves; thus the excellence of the author 's technique has now become a major concern. Recent recognition has been accorded, too, to the fact that the stories were in the vanguard of their time with regard to the choice of, as well as the treatment of, theme. Intro. p. 1-2.

CARNEIRO, Sarah Maria Borges. Clarice Lispector e Katherine Mansfield: relações de poder no universo infantil. 2013. 123f. – Dissertação (Mestrado) – Universidade Federal do Ceará, Programa de Pós-graduação em Letras, Fortaleza (CE), 2013. / Submitted by Márcia Araújo (marcia_m_bezerra@yahoo.com.br) on 2014-05-20T12:33:45Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2013_dis_smbcarneiro.pdf: 1076912 bytes, checksum: 1691f6f257955cffc6e0057eb7b4037a (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Márcia Araújo(marcia_m_bezerra@yahoo.com.br) on 2014-05-20T13:44:12Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2013_dis_smbcarneiro.pdf: 1076912 bytes, checksum: 1691f6f257955cffc6e0057eb7b4037a (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2014-05-20T13:44:12Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2013_dis_smbcarneiro.pdf: 1076912 bytes, checksum: 1691f6f257955cffc6e0057eb7b4037a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013 / The present paper aims to exam comparatively the short stories “Felicidade Clandestina”, “Preciosidade” and “Os desastres de Sofia”, from Clarice Lispector, and “A casa de bonecas”, “A pequena governanta” and “Aula de canto”, from Katherine Mansfield. The problem is concerned with the strategies developed by children and adults to move around the relations of power that are developed associated with childhood. Even though they belong to different historical and cultural contexts, the writers are similar because they point out the presence of children characters in their narratives. Working with the hypothesis that the tensions that connect the Idea of power and childhood and unstable, we intend to verify how the characters of the selected short stories move around the childhood universe, breaking up with the paradigm of child’s victimization. / O presente trabalho tem como objetivo examinar comparativamente os contos “Felicidade Clandestina”, “Preciosidade” e “Os desastres de Sofia”, de Clarice Lispector, e “A casa de bonecas”, “A pequena governanta” e “Aula de canto”, de Katherine Mansfield. O problema se coloca no que diz respeito às estratégias desenvolvidas pelas crianças e adultos para circular entre as relações de poder que se desenvolvem associadas à infância. Mesmo ocupando espaços históricos e culturais diferentes, as escritoras se assemelham por destacarem a presença de personagens crianças em suas narrativas. Partindo da hipótese de que as tensões que ligam a ideia de poder e infância são instáveis, buscaremos verificar como as personagens dos contos selecionados circulam no universo da infância, rompendo com o paradigma da vitimização da criança.

Cette thèse se propose d’explorer les rapports entre enfance et sentiment poétique pour considérer la manière dont l’impression enfantine peut se faire le modèle, en filigrane, d’une esthétique narrative moderne. Un corpus composé de récits de Pierre Loti, Marcel Proust, Colette, Virginia Woolf et Katherine Mansfield permet d’analyser l’inscription fictionnelle de personnages enfants pour montrer la similitude de caractéristiques supposément enfantines et de traits relevant d’une certaine conception du récit moderne, au tournant des XIXe et XXe siècles : le primat de la subjectivité, une pénétration du texte par le sentiment poétique et une esthétique de la discontinuité cristallisant le récit sur des moments privilégiés. L’analyse convoque également des représentations de l’enfant, tant scientifiques que littéraires, du XVIIIe au XXe siècle. Les écrits des premiers psychologues de l’enfance, les textes romantiques mettant en scène des enfants poètes, et l’affirmation baudelairienne qui fait du génie une « enfance retrouvée » sont interrogés pour mettre au jour les conceptions fantasmatiques de l’enfant implicitement activées par les auteurs de ces récits. La croyance et l’imagination proverbiales de l’enfant, la supposée authenticité d’un âge proche des origines, sont autant de projections utopiques que charrie la littérature, et que cautionnent, dans une certaine mesure, les pensées philosophiques et scientifiques jusqu’au premier tiers du XXe siècle. Cette étude sonde les sources et les enjeux de ces représentations pour comprendre ce qui les motive et explorer leurs résonances avec certaines modalités d’écriture, entre poésie, mysticisme et impressionnisme. / This thesis explores the relationship between childhood and poetical feeling to consider how childhood impressions can implicitly model a modern narrative aesthetics. A corpus of narratives by Pierre Loti, Marcel Proust, Colette, Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield serves to analyse the fictional inscription of child characters and show the likeness between allegedly childish characteristics and traits related to a certain conception of the modern narrative, at the corner of the 19th and 20th centuries. Among these characteristics : the predominance of subjectivity, a poetical feeling pervading the text, and a discontinuous narrative focusing on moments of being. The analysis summons both literary and scientific representations of the child, from 18th to 20th century. It convokes the theories of the first child-psychologists along with Romantic texts figuring child poets and questions the premise, according to Baudelaire, that genius is based on « childhood recovered ». In doing so it means to shed light on the phantasmatic conceptions of the child implicitly activated by the authors of these narratives. The child’s proverbial imagination and credulity, the presumed authenticity of an age closer to origins are as many utopic projections conveyed by literature and cautioned, to a certain point, by philosophic and scientific thoughts until the first third of the 20th century. This study examines their sources and their stakes to understand what accounts for them and to investigate their resonance with certain writing dimensions, such as poetry, mysticism and impressionism.