Short Stories – The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield

Katherine Mansfield was a New Zealand writer who died far too young at the age of 34, 100 years ago. She is considered, despite having her life so prematurely curtailed, as being one of the most important voices in the modernist movement.

It was the intention of modernism to break away from traditional forms of writing in poetry and prose fiction, but also in the content such writing represented.

Unfortunately, political and economic interests in the 1920s and 1930s came along at a time when cultural and social creativity seemed about to explode. What would have become of modernism had other events not turned people’s attentions elsewhere?

The Garden Party, which I won’t ruin for you by giving too much of the plot away, but upon reading, it made me consider the role of classism in historical discourse. Has classism been addresse ...