Class Consciousness in Mansfield’s Classic Story

In a recent Forbes column, usually “devoted to Western (and sometimes Eastern) ‘Great Books’ or ‘Classics”’, contributor David Bahr this time examines the “minor Classics”. “These books or authors are not quite in the pantheon but are of an enduring quality that more than repay one’s consideration,” Bahr writes, turning his gaze to Katherine Mansfield’s The Garden Party.

“The short stories of Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) are, by my lights, ‘minor classics’,” Bahr continues, in a short introduction encouraging readers to “pursue her work further”.

“To get a sense of Mansfield, read first her famous story, ‘The Garden Party’ (1923), which introduces a sense of her home life (socialite, New Zealand) and the acute class consciousness she must have felt as a thoughtful young woman.”

Original article by David Bahr, Forbes, August 26, 2022.