Katherine Mansfield

1888-1923. Modernist author, most famous for her short stories.

Katherine Mansfield is born in Wellington/New Zealand on the 14th of October in 1888 as Kathleen Mansfield Beauchamp, daughter of two Australians who immigrated to New Zealand. Her father, Harold Beauchamp, is a successful banker, that way, Katherine’s family leads a rich and wealthy life.

Already during her childhood and later adolescence, Katherine gets to know Great Britain and even lives there for three years, when attending a British girl’s school.

Katherine loves to write and in 1908, she finally leaves her mother country and immigrates to London. Only when leaving her home and her family, she thinks, she is able to become a real writer. In London, she leads the life of a rebellious narrator. Here, she also comes across the suffragist movement and she gets to know Virginia Woolf, a famous writer herself, who soon becomes one of her closest friends, but also one of her hardest rivals.

In 1912, when she is 24, she marries John Middleton Murry who also writes. During that time, Katherine’s health degrades and in 1918, she is diagnosed with tuberculosis. Katherine does not feel good, her illness makes her struggle. She finally decides to leave London in order to recuperate in the sunny and southern climate of San Remo. However, the atmosphere of the health resort of San Remo does not make her feel good either. She feels lonely, is even hunted by hallucinations.

On the 9th of January in 1923, Katherine Mansfield dies in Fontainbleau/France.

Citati, Pietro. 1982. Katherine Mansfield. Beschreibung eines Lebens. Europäische Verlagsanstalt, Frankfurt am Main.

Tomalin, Claire. 1990. Katherine Mansfield. Eine Lebensgeschichte. Wagner, Frankfurt am Main.