Picture Credit- Dublin Shakespeare Society
“Would you not like to try all sorts of lives- one is so very small- but that is the satisfaction of writing- one can impersonate so many people.”
-Katherine Mansfield
Like she says in the quote about writers living so many lives through their work, Katherine Mansfield did so too. Her stories sure talk about societal issues but most of all they portray people. The different kinds.
You just have to read a couple of her stories to really understand the depth of emotions she was able to achieve in her work, without ever mentioning them in the form of words. Katherine Mansfield’s stories make you feel the ripples that mean so much more than waves and one such story is ‘The Garden Party’.
Introduction
Name of the Story - The Garden Party
Writer’s name - Katherine Mansfield
Genre - Fiction
Language - English
Synopsis - Spoiler Alert!
Laura is an upper-class, teenage girl who lives with her family, the Sheridans in New Zealand. Although she belongs to the bourgeoisie, Laura has a keen interest in the mannerisms of the working class and is quite interested in them.
On a day when the family is hosting a garden party, Laura finds out about the death of a working-class man, who lives just down the road from them. Laura is very distressed with the news and pleads with her parents to cancel the party but in vain.
After the party, Laura visits the family of the deceased with a basket of leftover food from the party. But when she enters the house, something inside her clicks, altering her forever.
About the Author
Picture Credit- Pinterest
Born Kathleen Mansfield on the 14th of October, 1888, she was one of the most prominent Modernist writers. She wrote many poems and short stories under the pen-name Katherine Mansfield.
Leaving her home New Zealand at the young age of nineteen, she went on to settle in England and became well-acquainted with the Bloomsbury Group, especially Virginia Woolf.
Katherine Mansfield’s notable works include ‘In a German Pension’, ‘Bliss and Other Stories’, ‘The Doves Nest’, ‘The Garden Party and Other Stories’, etc. She was diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis in 1917 and died at the age of thirty-four in France.
About the Story
The story begins with the Sheridan family working zealously on organising the garden party they will be hosting that afternoon. Laura goes out to attend to the men who have come with the marquee and is quite impressed by the men’s mannerisms.
Laura finds their free and open style of conversing quite refreshing from the high-class groomed socialites she was used to.
Laura returns back inside to find her family preparing zealously for the party and her sisters Meg and Jose moving the furniture around. Jose begins to sing a rather melancholy song while playing the piano.
After having a look at the food in the kitchen, Laura and Jose find out that Mr. Scott, a working-class man who lived very near their house has passed away. Laura doesn’t think that having a party was appropriate, but neither her sister nor her mother agree. They think that Laura is being too sensitive about it.
Laura goes to her room to try on her new hat and after watching herself with the hat on, becomes quite nebulous and excited about the party. She decides to forget the matter until the party is over. After the party, Mrs. Sheridan gives Laura a basket of leftover food to bring to the Scotts’.
Laura is welcomed in by Mrs. Scott’s sister, sees the pitiable widow whois understandably devastated and then is led to Mr. Scott’s corpse. On seeing Mr. Scott’s face, Laura is intrigued by the sublimity of it. She doesn’t find him anything like a dead person. His face looks to her as beautiful as ever and he just appears to be dreaming.
Overwhelmed with emotions, she runs out of the house and finds her brother Laurie on the streets. When she sees her brother, she cannot hold it in any longer and begins to cry in his arms.
The story ends with Laura saying “Isn’t life..” and Laurie understanding her completely, replying “Isn’t it, darling?”
Themes Involved
Mansfield has definitely tried to bring out the theme of class difference in the story. In fact it is one that runs throughout the course of the story. ‘Garden Party’ was written in 1923, when the distinction of class was very prevalent in the English- speaking countries.
So, it wasn’t normal for an upper-class girl like Laura to be enamored by the people who have just come to place a marquee or feel so much about a working-class man’s death.
The next theme in the story is definitely that of death. Seeing Mr. Scott’s body makes Laura realize that death is the ultimate truth and in fact she observes how very life-like death is.
The whole reality of it and her own higher position in the society and the true state of the people that were “below” her makes her emotionally overwhelmed.
Famous Quotes
“It’s all the fault… of these absurd class distinctions. Well, for her part, she didn’t feel them. Not a bit, not an atom.”
“They were the greatest possible eyesore, and they had no right to be in the neighbourhood at all.”
“Ah, what happiness it is to be with people who all are happy, to press hands, press cheeks, smile into eyes.”
The Bottom Line
Mansfield’s power of saying things without actually having said them is something that every aspiring writer wishes to have. She definitely had a way with words, so much so that she didn’t even need to use a lot of them. ‘The Garden Party’ is her one such work.
After reading the story such things will dawn upon you that haven’t been explicitly said. And for this reason and many more, I suggest you read this story.
My Ratings for the Story - 5 on 5
Read the Story here - The Garden Party
Written By - Sakshi Singh
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