Katherine Mansfield
Katherine Mansfield
Kathleen Mansfield Murrywas a prominent New Zealand modernist short story writer who was born and brought up in colonial New Zealand and wrote under the pen name of Katherine Mansfield. At 19, Mansfield left New Zealand and settled in the United Kingdom, where she became a friend of modernist writers such as D.H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf. In 1917 she was diagnosed with extrapulmonary tuberculosis, which led to her death at the age of 34...
NationalityNew Zealander
ProfessionAuthor
Date of Birth14 October 1888
stars writing dark
I think of you often. Especially in the evenings, when I am on the balcony and it’s too dark to write or to do anything but wait for the stars. A time I love. One feels half disembodied, sitting like a shadow at the door of one’s being while the dark tide rises. Then comes the moon, marvellously serene, and small stars, very merry for some reason of their own. It is so easy to forget, in a worldly life, to attend to these miracles.
dark remembers-everything childhood
Do you remember your childhood? I am always coming across these marvelous accounts by writers who declare that they remember 'everything.' I certainly don't. The dark stretches, the blanks, are much bigger than the bright glimpses. I seem to have spent most of my time like a plant in a cupboard.
beach lying dark
I love the night. I love to feel the tide of darkness rising, slowly and slowly washing, turning over and over, lifting, floating, all that lies strewn upon the dark beach, all that lies hid in rocky hollows.
fine further gets hand rare warming
E. M. Forster never gets any further than warming the teapot. He's a rare fine hand at that. Feel this teapot. Is it not beautifully warm? Yes, but there ain't going to be no tea.
accept life suffering
Everything in life that we really accept undergoes a change. So suffering must become Love. That is the mystery.
asking friend future hope present share treating
I am treating you as my friend asking you share my present minuses in the hope I can ask you to share my future pluses.
alone beneath lower mask prepared terrible until yes
It's a terrible thing to be alone -- yes it is -- it is -- but don't lower your mask until you have another mask prepared beneath --as terrible as you like --but a mask.
arms brief letter moment
This is not a letter but my arms around you for a brief moment
begin failures immense importance means
When we can begin to take our failures seriously, it means we are ceasing to be afraid of them. It is of immense importance to learn to laugh at ourselves.
becomes life
Life never becomes a habit to me. It's always a marvel.
best delight infinite work
To work -- to work! It is such infinite delight to know that we still have the best things to do.
appalling build good regret waste
Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can't build on it; it's only good for wallowing in.
ask asking friend future hope present share treating
I'm treating you as a friend asking you to share my present minuses in the hope that I can ask you to share my future pluses
friendship sacred truth-is
The truth is friendship is every bit as sacred and eternal as marriage.