The Garden Party

Katherine Mansfield’s The Garden Party is a poignant short story that dissects class divides and moral awakening through a suburban garden party. Centered on Laura Sheridan, a sheltered upper-class girl, the tale pivots when a working-class neighbor dies accidentally amid the party’s frivolities. Laura’s urge to cancel the celebration clashes with her family’s indifference, exposing the privileged’s detachment from ordinary suffering. Mansfield’s subtle prose contrasts the garden’s sunlit luxury with the neighbor’s somber cottage. Laura’s final visit to the bereaved family sparks a quiet epiphany about life’s dualities—beauty and despair, privilege and vulnerability. A concise, piercing masterpiece of modernist fiction.