Author Description

Among the numerous pieces of writing that Katherine Mansfield produced during her short life, there were fifteen stories that were not completed on her death but which she had intended for inclusion in her collection named after one of them, The Dove's Nest. This volume of her stories, reproduced here, was published posthumously in 1923. J.B. Priestley wrote of them: 'the merest beginnings are capital reading. Even though we never come to the point, and do not know what the stories are about, it does not seem to matter very much. The delicate enchantments of her art are there as of old.' In tribute to Mansfield and in celebration of the short-story form that she made her own, the first paragraphs of those fifteen stories have been given to a range of top New Zealand writers, not to complete as Mansfield might have intended but to use as a starting place for their own new and contemporary story. Many of the writers have their own connection to Mansfield, all are known for the quality of their writing, and each has used the inspiration of Mansfield's work in a distinct, entertaining and stimulating way.