Enchanting and Disenchanted Narratives: Fairy Tales and the Short Fiction of Katherine Mansfield and DH Lawrence

Abstract

This dissertation aims to explore the relevance of intertextual references to the fairy tale in the short fiction of two modernist authors, Katherine Mansfield and D.H. Lawrence. This dissertation departs from the hypothesis that both the narrative models and the recurrent motifs of the literary fairy tale provided both authors with a rich system of references despite the fact that most modernist authors attempted to detach the short story from traditional forms of narration. This dissertation analyses a corpus of short fairy tale-related narratives taking into consideration structuralist, psychoanalytic, feminist and historicist approaches to the study of fairy tales. The evidence that the textual analysis provides shows that Mansfield and Lawrence deploy fairy tale elements with different discursive strategies which reveal individual ethic and aesthetic concerns. Mansfield shows an awareness of the ideological values inscribed in the tales and criticises them through parody, whereas Lawrence tends to exploit their imagery and fantastic dimension to articulate his complex views on human relationships and the place of the individual in the universe.