Katherine Mansfield, The Woman Behind The Books (Including Letters, Journals, Essays & Articles). Katherine Mansfield
Fitzherbert Terrace
“Wellington.
“23. ix. 07.
“E. J. Brady, Esq.
“Dear Sir —
“Thank you for your letter — I liked the peremptory tone — With regard to the Vignettes I am sorry that (they) resemble their illustrious relatives to so marked an extent — and assure you — they feel very much my own — This style of work absorbs me at present but — well — it cannot be said that anything you have of mine is ‘copied’ — Frankly — I hate plagiarism.
“I send you some more work — practically there is nothing local — except the ‘Botanical Gardens’ Vignette. The reason is that for the last few years London has held me very tightly — and I’ve not yet escaped.
“You ask for some details as to myself. I am poor — obscure — just eighteen years of age — with a voracious appetite for everything — and principles as light as my prose —
“If this pleases you — this MSS. — please know there is a great deal more where this came from —
“I am very grateful to you and very interested in your magazine —
“Sincerely
“K. M. Beauchamp.”
Her letter reveals the marks left by Dorian Gray. When she, rather rashly, wrote that she was a person “with principles as light as my prose,” she was echoing and improving upon the sentences of Wilde which she had already copied into her reading notes:”I like persons with no principles better than anything in the world.”
Evidently her statement of her age aroused Mr. Brady’s suspicions. If she really was only eighteen — he seems to have argued — then her work could not be original. But probably she was a great deal more than eighteen — the mature woman of thirty whom Tom Mills had conjured up. Kathleen showed a letter expressing these doubts to her father. His reply (written without her knowledge) was also preserved by Mr. Brady.
“W. M. Bannatyne & Co., Ltd.
“10th Octbr., 1907.
“Dear Sir: —
“My daughter, Kathleen, has shown me the letters you have written in respect to her literary contributions, and I desire to thank you sincerely for the practical encouragement you have given her. At the same time, I should like to assure you that you need never have any hesitation in accepting anything from her upon the asumption that it may not be original matter. She, herself, is, I think, a very original character, and writing — whether it be good or bad — comes to her quite naturally. In fact, since she was eight years of age, she has been producing poetry and prose. It may be that she inherits the literary talent of some members of our family, amongst them being my cousin, the authoress of Elizabeth and her German Garden, and other well-known books.
“As to Kathleen’s statement concerning her age, this, I notice, you politely question, but I can assure you that she spoke quite correctly when she told you she was only eighteen years old.
“Until the close of 1906 she was a student at a college in London, and left that institution to return to New Zealand with me, and other members of my family, in October of that year. I may add that she has always been an omnivorous reader, and posesses a most retentive memory.
“Pardon me for troubling you with these details, but I wished to deal with the two points raised in your kind letter, viz., ‘originality’ and ‘age.’
“In concluding, may I ask you to be kind enough to treat this as a private letter and not to mention to Kathleen that I have written you concerning her.
“I am, “Yours very truly
“Harold Beauchamp.”
The encouragement had been practical indeed, in a form convincing to her father — a cheque, which Kathleen promptly acknowledged.
“4 Fitzherbert Terrace
“Wellington —
“11, x, 07.
“Dear Mr. Brady
“Thank you for your note — and the cheque — too —
“Encouragement has studiously passed me by for so long that I am very appreciative.
“I like the name ‘Silhouette’ — If you do print more than one ‘Vignette’ in the November issue — please do not use the name K. M. Beauchamp. I am anxious to be read only as K. Mansfield or K. M.
“Mr. Brady — I am afraid that so much kindness on your part may result in an inundation of MSS. from me — but the kindness is very pleasant.
“Sincerely
“Kathleen Beauchamp.”
The selection of a pen-name cost her no little effort. She was determined not to use her own. She meant to leave the old life completely, once she was free, and in London; and for a new life — to which her now published writing might open the door — she needed a new name. And, no doubt, she was partly influenced by the example of her father’s cousin, who had achieved world-wide fame with a series of anonymous books (of which the sixth had just been published).
Kathleen tried several experiments: first “Julian Mark” (in the rhythm of “Dorian Gray”); the German form of her own name,”Kath Schönfeld” (which she had used in corresponding in German with Arnold Trowell while he was in Brussels); and “K. Mansfield.” That she decided permanently upon her second Christian name, her Grandmother’s name — Mansfield — may have been due to something which recently had happened.
The Grandmother had been living with a friend in Bolton Street, off Hill Street since the girls’ return from London. Time flew swiftly — Kathleen was always meaning to stop to see her.
At a quarter to twelve, the last few minutes before the New Year of 1907, Grandmother Mansfield Dyer had a stroke.
Kathleen never forgave herself for being so wrapped in her own problems that she had let the time pass until too late. She was not devoid of sentiment. Death always made her keenly conscious of the essence of a personality, and this was her first experience of the death of one dear to her.
But it was not until she began writing for the New Age, in 1910, that she returned to the form Katherine — after experimenting with “Katherina” and “Katharina.”
For these first stories, submitted to The Native Companion, she asked “to be read only as K. Mansfield or K.M.” and how eagerly she awaited the first publication!
“It seems strange to remember buying a copy of The Native Companion on Lambton Quay and standing under a lamppost with darling Leslie to see if my story had been printed.”
Under this new incentive she wrote continuously — of the City in which she lived her detached existence — of cafés, and “life” : the girl who bought Parma violets instead of a bun; and the girl who — having given the violets to a boy who begged them — found them discarded on the street. She wrote of “Mimi,” and the long stairs to the top of Westminster, and the delicate images floating before them as they gazed over London — wondering how long they would remember. She wrote of Gwen, and the dreams they had for fame in the future.
She sent copies of stories to each of them, so they should see how London was loved, and they, too, being part of it. The mails to Arnold, to Ida, to “Mimi,” and Gwen, to Sylvia were heavy with these stories, and with letters that often reached ten pages. How could the days have been long enough for so much writing? With what facility she wrote when the mood was right! And how fully and poignantly she wrote when she was unhappy! For she was one who grew most quickly under pressure of unhappiness. Since she was willing, from that moment onward, to sacrifice to writing almost every other thing that life was to hold — so she owed to adversity and heartbreak