Introduction


Katherine Mansfield lived an unorthodox life, especially considering the times she lived in. She grew up in New Zealand but later moved to England where she met, married, and left her first husband in the span of three weeks. During the same period, she got pregnant by a family friend but soon had a miscarriage. In 1911, she contracted gonorrhea, which left her wracked with arthritis for the rest of her life. Her first short-story collection was not as successful as she hoped, so she wrote a much darker story, “The Woman at the Store,” which helped her achieve some of the success she so desired. It was not, however, until the end of her life that her writing matured and won her the respect of critics and the public.

Essential Facts

  1. Mansfield was born in a well-to-do family and was first cousin to the author Countess Elizabeth von Arnim, who wrote The Enchanted April.
  2. Before beginning her writing career, Mansfield was a cellist and at first sought her fortune as a professional musician.
  3. Virginia Woolf wrote in her diary that Mansfield’s work was “the only writing I have ever been jealous of.”
  4. Mansfield almost died of pleurisy after getting tuberculosis in 1917. In 1918, she had a major hemorrhage. She sought different treatments, many of which left her in worse shape than when she started.
  5. New Zealand’s most prestigious short-story competition is named after Katherine Mansfield.