Born in Wellington, New Zealand, Katherine Mansfield managed during her short life (1888-1923) to write short stories whose perfection, precision, and beauty could be compared to those of Chekhov. What unfolds, rises to the surface, and ultimately reveals itself is the marrow of life, as it appears unadorned and abruptly in the eyes of a person with heightened sensitivity: unabashed, complex, decisively simple.

Her collection of short stories (the third in order) The Garden Party is a work of maturity. Fifteen short stories were printed in 1922, a year before Mansfield died in Fontainebleau, France. In the first, a day dawns beautifully; in the last, a night falls grimly.

In between them, everything: the gurgling smile of a baby, the scent of lavender, loneliness, the fear of death, an old platter of watercress soaked in the sun, the intensity and variety of the moment, the transference of grief into a reconciling feeling, the happiness of being alive. The characteristics of poetry: economy, freshness, surprise.

[Excerpt from the text on the back cover of the edition]