The introduction of the short story to literature created a whole new field for writers and readers to experiment with and enjoy. Katherine Mansfield was born and raised in New Zealand and then moved to England where she spent a great deal of her life. Mansfield is known as one of the most remarkable writers to come out of New Zealand and England. Katherine Mansfield's "specialization" is the short story. Mansfield wrote many short stories in her lifetime and is recognized as having several masterpieces in that form. Her short stories are quite different than most short stories written by the Modernist writers of her time. Mansfield liked for her readers to become immediately involved in her stories and usually drops the reader into the situation at the start of the story with no description or identification of the time or place in which the stories occur. She assumes that her readers had prior knowledge of the characters or that they will determine any information that they need to know on their own. On top of the reader being left floundering, Mansfield's stories have no plot. That is to say that her stories do not follow the classic form of exposition, rising action,

A recurring theme in many of Katherine Mansfield's stories is death and the effects that death and grief have on her characters' lives. Through her skillful narration, the private emotions that one experiences when dealing with death, or when experiencing grief, are privy to the reader as they are let into the minds of the characters. One example of such a story in which the characters deal with death, and a unique grief, is "The Daughters of the Late Colonel". In this story, the main plot is that two spinster women, Constantia and Josephine, have just lost their domineering father and are having to take care of the funeral and other such duties. The story has a timid but slightly argumentative narration as the narrator slides back and forth between the sisters who are weak after spending their lives caring for their father. The women have had no independent action and, unfortunately, it does not seem as though they will be independent any time soon. The story is comical and yet, the subject, two grown women rendered incapable of living independent lives, is definitely not funny. Instead, the reader, although smiling at the time, gains a sense that these women have a difficult time taking control and grasping reality. In one instance, the women are in charge of the funeral, and when asked what kind of funeral they would prefer, Constantia nearly says, "A good one that will last", and has to suppress the childish urge to giggle (Mansfield 243). Even though they are now the heads of the household, Constantia and Josephine have trouble dealing with an unwanted house guest and an unruly maid. On top of their troubles in dealing with such problems, the women are further handicapped by their inability to accept their father's death. When they attempt to clean out their father's things, the women are overtaken by the absurd fear that their father is going to jump out of his wardrobe at any second and be angry with them for attempting to bury him. Constantia makes the first bold move of the story and asks Josephine, "Why shouldn't we be weak for once in our lives, Jug?" as she locks the wardrobe (Mansfield 246). Of course, the reader is aware of the irony of such a statement at they are weak, and it would be more appropriate for her to ask why shouldn't they be bold for once. The women finally come to realize that their father really and truly is dead when they hear a barrel-organ in the street that their father had abhorred and they run to stop it before they recognize that they shall never have to stop the music again because their father is gone. Josephine stops to ponder their mother's picture and wonders, "If mother had lived, might they have married?" (Mansfield 257). This thought is the first indication of possible regret for a life wasted. Unfortunately, she did not follow that thought with "Since father has died, why shouldn't life be different?". For a second, at the end of the story, the reader feels that the women might make some sort of decision as Constantia starts to say something and then claims to have forgotten her thought and Jug replies that she has "forgotten too" (Mansfield 259). As the women have this conversation, the sun has set, and it is obvious to the reader that they have experienced a symbolic death. The women are not going to deal with their father's death by moving on with their lives, they are going to live forever as they are with the grief that comes from a lost life.

Katherine Mansfield is a sensational writer. Her narration techniques of stream of consciousness and of an unseen but all-controlling narrator who lives through her characters give her stories an unmistakable air of life. Mansfield's characters jump off the page at the reader and pull the reader into their lives. Chronologically, as the end of her long battle with tuberculosis draws near, Mansfield's stories begin to reflect her preoccupation with death and its effect on the living. In "The Daughter

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Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page double spaced)