Lab Rats for a Test Case

To employ the reading strategies learned throughout Foster's novel, Katherine Mansfield's short story "The Garden Party" is offered for analyzation. Two questions are offered for consideration: first, what does the story signify? This story signifies the class differences in place in England, around 1922. Laura Sheridan comes from a very rich family that lived overlooking a set of cottages populated by lower-class workers, never thinking about the riches she lives with in contrast to the poverty of the workers. Until one of the workers is killed outside the house by a bucking horse. This causes Laura to have doubts about what is necessary to truly be happy in life, and to question why everyone has to place so much significance on the material objects or where someone lives, because in the end we are all the same, trying for the same goal of inner peace. Basically, the author is trying to say that everyone is the same in the end, (be it death or any other end) so why should simplicities such as status affect other's perceptions.
The second question for consideration: how does it signify? In the beginning of the story, Laura Sheridan is perfectly content in her world of parties, fancy clothing, and socializing. But, even as she accepts all of the conditions of being in the privileged class, she wonders about the working class. She notes that the workmen setting up the marquee are "so friendly", with "smiles that are so easy," even comparing them to "the silly boys she danced with and had Sunday supper with." Laura thinks she may like them better and realizes they are people just like her and the rest of her family, setting her up for the next revelation. Because of the accident with the workman, who lives just down the lane from the Sheridan's, Laura asks her mother to postpone the party out of respect for the workman's family, but her mother refuses, pushing Laura's request off as an unnecessary sacrifice, and "people like that don't expect us to make sacrifices for them." Laura manages to push her concerns to the far reaches of her consciousness during the party, but once the party is over she continues to ponder the question, although to herself. After Laura's concerns are brought up by her mother, and her father makes a tactless remark that unsettles everybody involved in the discussion, Laura and her mother decide to take the leftover food from the party and take it to the dead workman's family. Laura goes to the cottage of the workman and there views his body and the "happy [look]...saying I am content...far from all things." This shows Laura how even those who are seemingly "below" her and her family have the same needs, have the same desires, have the same goals as real people, no matter what class. The story ends with Laura telling her brother of the experience, how it was "marvellous" (not seeing the dead body...the symbolic discovery she observed) and finally seeing what life is...not what she thought it was but what it really was, how all people are equal in the end.

After reading the responses in the book to the questions, I didn't observe how Laura freed herself from the moral obligations she thought she had to the lower class. I thought she had made a great leap forward to understanding the lower class and those below her; instead, she found proof that her lifestyle had no impact on the lives of the workers, therefore giving her the justification to continue without worrying for them.

The essay explaining Forster's view of the story, comparing Laura to Persephone, adds to my appreciation of Mansfield's story. The parallels in the story seem so obvious once they are explained, but are so carefully integrated into the story that it is easy to miss unless carefully reading for the similarities. An author's ability to delicately weave together parallels from previous stories always amazes me and gives a greater appreciation for the story as a whole. This enriches the story for me by letting me bring in background knowledge to increase my understanding of the story's message.