Quotes from Katherine Mansfield

Do you ever want to hide, to be completely hidden so that nobody knows where you are. Sometimes one has a dreadful feeling of exposure–it's intolerable. I mustn't say these things.

Do you think there will be Mondays in heaven?' (...) 'Heaven will be one long Monday'.

Oh dear, I sometimes think... whatever should I do if anything were to... But, there, thinking's no good to any one—is it, madam? Thinking won't help. Not that I do it often. And if ever I do I pull myself up sharp, "Now, then, Ellen. At it again—you silly girl! If you can't find anything better to do than to start thinking!...

Bir ÅŸey elden gittiyse gitti demektir. Sona ermiÅŸ, bitmiÅŸtir. O zaman b?rak?n gitsin! Görmezden gelin onu, eÄŸer avunmaya ihtiyac?n?z varsa, yitirilen ÅŸeylerin asla geri gelmediÄŸini düÅŸünerek avutun kendinizi: Gelse bile yeni bir ÅŸeydir art?k, her seferinde yeni, baÅŸka bir ÅŸeydir. Elinizden ç?kt??? anda deÄŸiÅŸime uÄŸram??t?r.

When she is not serving she sits on a stool with her face turned, always, to the window. Her dark-ringed eyes search among and follow after the people passing, but not as if she was looking for somebody. Perhaps, fifteen years ago, she was; but now the pose has become a habit. You can tell from her air of fatigue and hopelessness that she must have given them up for the last ten years, at least.…

I have two rooms and a huge balcony, and so many mountains that I haven't even begun to climb them yet.

Katherine Mansfield Beauchamp Murry (1888–1923) was a prominent modernist writer of short fiction who was born and brought up in colonial New Zealand and wrote under the pen name of Katherine Mansfield. When she was 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. During the First World War, she contracted extrapulmonary tuberculosis, which led to her death at the age of 34.

Query: Why am I so bitter against Life? And why do I see her as a rag-picker on the American cinema, shuffling along wrapped in a filthy shawl with her old claws crooked over a stick? Answer: The direct result of the American cinema acting upon a weak mind.

Eleven o'clock. A knock at the door... I hope I haven't disturbed you, madam. You weren't asleep—were you? But I've just given my lady

Their first words always were as they ran to greet him, "What have you got for me, daddy?" and he had nothing. He would have to buy them some sweets at the station. But that was what he had done for the past four Saturdays; their faces had fallen last time when they saw the same old boxes produced again.

Eleven o'clock. A knock at the door... I hope I haven't disturbed you, madam. You weren't asleep—were you? But I've just given my lady her tea, and there was such a nice cup over, I thought

THEY knew how frightened she was; THEY saw how she turned her head away as she passed the mirror. What Linda always felt was that THEY wanted something of her, and she knew that if she gave herself up and was quiet, more than quiet, silent, motionless, something would really happen.

But Lottie staggered on the lowest verandah step like a bird fallen out of the nest. If she stood still for a moment she fell asleep, if she leaned against anything her eyes closed. She could not walk another step.

And besides, I've no patience with people who can't let go of things, who will follow after and cry out. When a thing's gone, it's gone. It's over and done with. Let it go then! Ignore it, and comfort yourself, if you do want comforting, with the thought that you never do recover the same thing that you lose. It's always a new thing.

It was simply marvelous. But Laurie--" She stopped, she looked at her brother. "Isn't life," she stammered, "isn't life--" But what life was she couldn't explain. No matter. He quite understood. "Isn't it, darling?" said Laurie.

Oh, mother, really you need not dust them. It would take years to dust all those little holes." And she frowned at the top of her mother's head and bit her lip with impatience. Mother's deliberate way of doing things was simply maddening. It was old age, she supposed, loftily.

The Samuel Josephs were not a family. They were a swarm. The moment you entered the house they cropped up and jumped out at you from under the tables, through the stair rails, behind the doors, behind the coats in the passage. Impossible to count them: impossible to distinguish between them.

Que noche! dijo -¿Conosce usted ese poema de Safo sobre sus manos en las estrellas...? Soy curiosamente sáfica. Y eso es tan importante... No sólo soy sáfica; encuentro en las obras de arte de todos los grandes autores, sobre todo en sus cartas inédtas, cierto aire, cierto indicio de mí misma... cierto parecido, cierta parte de mí misma, como mil reflejos de mis propias manos en un espejo oscuro El espirítu moderno - En un balneario alemán

Alice was a mild creature in reality, but she had the most marvellous retorts ready for questions that she knew would never be put to her. The composing of them and the turning of them over and over in her mind comforted her just as much as if they'd been expressed.

Well, I always tell my girls that it's better to mistrust people at first rather than trust them, and it's safer to suspect people of evil intentions rather than good  ones...It sounds rather hard but we've got to be women of the world, haven't we?

Jose loved giving orders to the servants, and they loved obeying her. She always made them feel they were taking part in some drama.

They had met at the club and Bertha had fallen in love with her, as she always did fall in love with beautiful women who had something strange about them.

I am so glad you like them', said he, staring at his feet. 'They seem to have got so much whiter since the moon rose.' And he turned his lean sorrowful long face to Bertha. 'There is a moon, you know.' She wanted to cry: I am sure there is--often--often.

Arriba, en la habitación de su padre y su madre, encontró un pastillero, negro y brillante por fuera y rojo por dentro, que contenía un copo de algodón. -Aquí podría guardar un huevo de pájaro -decidió