Identity Anxiety Of Women Intellectuals In Katherine Mansfield’s Selected Short Stories

Katherine Mansfield,“the master of the short story”, whose unique and insightfulthinking of women’s identity anxiety has reflected early women intellectuals’ striving fortheir own identities. The rise of women intellectuals, a breath of fresh air in the early20thcentury literature history, has greatly enriched Mansfield’s stories as well as contemporaryliterary works. The thesis focuses on the analysis of women intellectuals’ national identityanxiety, gender identity anxiety and cultural identity anxiety in Mansfield’s12short storiesto explore early women intellectuals’ campaigning for their own identities in the early20thcentury.The paper firstly analyzes the narrator’s national identity anxiety in the six stories inIn a German Pension. Owing to her nationality and social status, the narrator can not getover her identity as the Other in Germany. Besides, the narrator’s attitude towards heridentity as an English woman is vague, which strengthens her national identity anxiety.Then the thesis studies women intellectuals’ gender identity anxiety in the three stories inBliss and The Garden Party. The protagonist of “Bliss” Bertha suffers emotional betrayalsfrom men and women relentlessly and reveals deeply anxiety and helpless. Moreover, thetwo sisters Linda and Beryl choose narcissistic camouflage to escape from realisticcontradictions, but they still can not get rid of their identity anxiety. It is hard for womenintellectuals to find their own gender identity in gender activity exploration, thus they livein terror. Finally the thesis discusses the anxiety of women intellectuals seeking for theiridentity in literature groups in the five stories in Bliss, In a German Pension and TheGarden Party. In the German pension, the narrator can not be identified by the cure guestsin foreign culture circles. However, women intellectuals such as Isabel in “Marriage à LaMode” and Moss in “Pictures” also can not find their spiritual home in native culturalgroups. Due to the lack of spiritual belongingness, women intellectuals who wander out ofboth foreign and native literature groups fall into a state of anxiety and bothered bydisplacement.In conclusion, women intellectuals’ striving for their own identities in the early20thcentury is one of the idiosyncrasies of Mansfield’s works. It is also a critical and typicalliterary example to represent the growth of women intellectuals. Women intellectuals’actively campaigning for their own identities makes an everlasting contribution for the development of contemporary feminist theory and literature. Although in Mansfield’sworks women intellectuals’ pursuit of their own identities has not achieved a great success,it offers a powerful lesson for the exploration of modern women’s liberation.