Understanding Of Children Images In K.M.'s New Zealand Short Stories

Katherine Mansfield is one of the most famous women writers in the twentieth century English literature. She has really contributed a lot to the English literature, especially the development of the short stories. Katherine Mansfield is a prolific realistic writer, who left us lots of letters, countless journals and nearly a hundred short stories. She is good at describing the trifle things in daily life, which are easily neglected by others. She is also good at catching the inner changes of the characters and portrays them vividly by using poetical languages, poetical images and symbolism, etc, which make the trifle things contain deep meanings.Mansfield is specially good at portraying children images. She observes the adult world through the children's point of view. She portrays a group of vivid children characters in her New Zealand short stories. Up to now, few people have given a thorough analysis on those children images. I chose some typical children images from The Undiscovered Country by Katherine Mansfield as the topic to discuss, with the help of the materials from her letters, journals and her life story.I. The Mental Complex for HarmonyKatherine Mansfield passed the happiest time of her life under the shadow of illness, in addition, she drifted along the Continent, which pushed her into the sense of fear and in the sense of insecurity all the time, but she continuously maintains enthusiasm in literary creation which was due to her instinct demand for life. In order to get rid of the fear of death as well as the anxiety and the restlessness brought by death, Mansfield not only sought medical help in all directions but also adopted another effective method which was to write short stories on children theme as children often symbolize life and hope. By portraying children images in her stories, Mansfield was actually fighting with the god of death so as to extend her life and to get rid of her fears . We may understand that Mansfield molds a series of children images especially young girl images like Kezia and Laura to express her deep and instinctive love towards life.In Mansfield's mind, harmony only exists in the children's world. As a result, she portrays lot of children characters to express her love towards the world. She firmly advocates that the adult should maintain pure mind like the children's with every effort so that our world may become a holy and harmonious one. Without considering the impacts of the Ages, children are in general innocent, lovely and na?ve. Their every deed, every word and every behavior all make one feel pleasant and comfortable. In Katherine Mansfield's point of view, children are good at seeking beauty and truth, and they are the symbols of the wonderful future world. Children's laugh, crying, happiness and troubles are the indication of some material aspects of the real human life. Through the description of children, she tries to show the readers her love for the world, her confidence in human beings, especially her pursuit for harmony.II. True Understanding of Miserable and Bitter LifeDisillusionment is one of Mansfield's favorite themes, which reflects her true understanding of the miserable and bitter life. Mansfield struggles continuously against the complicated interpersonal relationship, against the poor sickness occurring simultaneously, which lead to her disillusionment towards life. And such kind of mental state is apparently reflected through the characters under her pen.Mansfield is good at portraying human being's sense of disillusionment at different stages. In Sun and Moon, she takes children's disillusionment as her subject matter. In Mansfield's view, beauty is harmony and harmony is beauty. When beauty is destroyed, Sun cries loudly as he can't keep the beauty exist eternally. Mansfield demonstrates Sun's longing for eternal beauty, which actually expresses her desire for harmony. She also criticizes parent's ignorance for understanding the inner world of the children, which will definitely hinder their mental and physical growth.III. The Sanctuary for the Painful SoulLoneliness is one of the common themes in the 20th century Western modern literature and Mansfield is one of the earlier writers who explores this theme. As a kind of existence, loneliness reflects Mansfield's mental process in searching for her spiritual homestead. Through the understanding of her characters'inner world, we can figure out Mansfield's longing for the harmonious relationship between men.In The Doll's House and Little Girl Mansfield portrays the young girls'loneliness caused by the difference of the social strata and the ignorance of the parents. The two poor sisters in The Doll's House can understand each other and help each other though they are isolated by the other rich girls. In Little Girl, Kezia's confusion is precisely her desire for harmony between her father and herself. Through the portrait of these characters, the writer expresses her desire for the harmonious relationship among people.IV. The Bright Lamp Leading to the Wonderful FutureSince the beginning of the human history, rebel has been a repeated theme in myth, philosophy and literature. Human civilization has a close relationship with rebellious spirit, which actually encourages the progress of the civilization of human race. Rebel is struggle, and struggle can help achieve harmony. Without struggle, without harmony.Mansfield has portrayed a series of characters with rebellious spirit in her New Zealand short stories and among them, the most outstanding one is Kezia in The Doll's House. Kezia's rebellious spirit is a kind of growing-up feelings, which shows her intense self-expressing desire, and her hope to gain others'attention and respect. Mansfield portrays Kezia as a girl who is bold enough to neglect the family rules, the restriction and suppression coming from her mother, her aunt as well as her elder sister. But her rebellious spirit mainly comes from her richer sympathy compared to that of the adults, comes from her despising to the social position, and comes from her desire to eliminate the class prejudice in order to achieve the harmonious relationship between the rich and the poor. Kezia's desire actually embodies Mansfield's own desire for achieving the harmony among people.In her short life, Mansfield struggles continuously against the complicated interpersonal relationship, against the poor sickness occurring simultaneously. Only writing could bring her some kind of eternity and tranquility. Mansfield longed for seeking both spiritual and physical balanced harmony inside herself in the Gurdjieff Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man, Fontainebleau-Avon. But she has not finally been able to find the harmonious unification which she longs for even in her dreams. But her happy desire for that forever framed firmly in her works.Harmony is an essence and perpetuity. Today, harmony still has the vital significance as the value orientation. The pleasure of life does not lie in the success or failure and it does not lie in the birth and death, either. Instead, life is to enjoy experience brought by harmony."Love harmony and treasure life"is the moral and lesson left by Mansfield as well as her New Zealand children stories.