Oh, I simply love the wounded
Christopher Hawtree
THE STORIES OF KATHERINE MANSFIELD edited by Anthony Alpers OUP, £17.50 In her lifetime, Katherine Mansfield published three collections of stories. One of these she soon came to disown, and none of them brought her much money. In the years after her death in 1923, there was such a flood of publications, which even included a volume of her poems, that the obloquy surrounding John Middleton Mur- ry increased considerably. Whatever the propriety of issuing all those works might have been, the passing years have found Murry held in a different scorn, one that chides him for a somewhat slapdash atti- tude to his editing of those books.
As the centenary of her birth approaches, the academic industry has reached full throttle. An edition of the letters, excellently balancing the needs of readers and thesis-writers, is in progress, supported by a network of grants, sabbatic- al leave and secretarial assistance which she might have preferred to the demands of hack-work. Now, subsidised by the Canada Council, comes a new collection of the stories themselves, edited by a man so in thrall to his subject that he has written two biographies of her. Unlike the much- reprinted Constable — and Penguin Collected Stories, this hefty volume has to be read at a desk. Boldly labelled 'Defini- tive Edition', it suggests the almost obses- sive completeness commonly associated with such productions. Despite the inclu- sion of new material, the book is none the less about the same length as the collection which bundled together her own three books and the two which were post- humously assembled by Murry.
Although an Emeritus Professor, Alpers's understanding of the word 'defini- tive' might, then, indicate that he is follow- ing a tradition set by John Middleton Murry when he tinkered further with his own earlier editions. Alpers also follows a more recent custom, that of lumbering the life's work of his subject with a dedication page of his own devising, in this case one to the memory of some crony — 'Poet and Scholar' — who was aged eight when Katherine Mansfield herself died. (How much more graceful and appropriate it was for Anne Olivier Bell to note at the end of the preface that 'did I not feel it presump- tuous, I would dedicate this publication of his wife's diaries to the dear memory of Leonard Woolf.') It is a pity that Professor Alpers should have imposed himself on the book in such a way, for his choice of stories, the way in which he has aranged them and his collation of the texts allow one to follow Katherine Mansfield's de- velopment more clearly than before.
Not only is there now a chronological sequence, but the abandoned (as distinct from unfinished) ones included by Murry have been removed, as have some which were done simply for money, and previous- ly uncollected pieces have been added. (One long story, 'Brave Love', has been left to moulder in the academic journal where it first appeared a dozen years ago.) Professor Alpers's judgment is sound, and the result is that one can watch her move from the tentative New Zealand begin- nings with their clutter of literary refer- ences to the early experiments which she made amid the chaos of her life in Edwar- dian London, all of which would evolve into the assured volumes of Bliss and The Garden Party. The collection also makes more prominent, and tantalising, the stor- ies, such as 'The Fly', that she wrote in the period before her death. The distinctly satirical phase of her work, which found an outlet in the New Age and previously familiar from the In a German Pension volume, assumes a crucial, transitional importance here. A couple of short sketch- es satirise Bennett and Wells — the latter 'is probably also hers. If it isn't it ought to be,' remarks Professor Alpers (thank goodness he has not been asked for his views on the Shakespeare/Bacon con- troversy). Although others parody the Russians held in such esteem at the time, they equally mark the influence that they made on her. Some of the satirical pieces, which point to a developing sense of dialogue, have an astonishing crudity. Two ladies are on a bus which pulls up outside Selfridge's: Jump, dear, jump. It's easy to see you're not a Londoner. Wasn't that fearfully interest- ing? I wonder what it really was. But such extraordinary things do happen nowadays, that I don't see why she couldn't say it, even in a 'bus. I thought the war had done away with the idea that there was anything you couldn't speak abut. I mean the things one reads in the papers, and the wounded that one even sees in the streets have made such a difference, haven't they? I love the wound- ed, don't you? Oh, I simply love them. And their sweet blue and red uniforms are so cheerful and awfully effective, aren't they?
The tone is that of Dame Edna or those women who congregate in Monty Python launderettes. A similar manner has also infected Professor Alpers. His 1980 biogra- phy had a somewhat petulant air, and it recurs in his annotation of this edition. Of `The Garden Party' he comments that Virginia Woolf, after dipping into the book to which this story gave its name, said in her diary that Katherine's stories made her want to rinse her mind; but the rinsing was not complete. She later devoted a novel to a woman (with a difficult daughter) who is to give a party, with lots of flowers, but the day is marred by a death in the street. Mrs Dalloway also contains some interesting business with a hat.
There are familiar references to Jack Mur- ry and, in discussing the sexual suppres- sions in the Constable text of `Je Ne Parle Pas Francais', he comments that these were made 'at the insistence of Michael Sadleir (later briefly famous for his novel of a London prostitute, Fanny By Gas- light)' . These sort of remarks might appear witty badinage in a common room or at a publisher's party; printed, the comments on Virginia Woolf are hardly criticism, which should not have a place in textual analysis anyway, and the account of Sadleir is a fatuous summary of a man whose diverse interest in Victorian fiction con- tinues to make itself felt. If Professor Alpers is a contemporary of the man whose name adorns the dedication page, it is rather late to advise him to grow up.
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