The Woman at the Store

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The Woman At The Store is a 1912 short story by Katherine Mansfield. It was first published in Rhythm in Spring 1912 under the penname of Lili Heron.^[1]

1 Plot summary
2 Characters
3 Major themes
4 References to actual history
5 Literary significance
6 Links
7 Footnotes

[edit] Plot summary

Jo, Jim and the narrator are riding horses, then stop at a store where Jim went four years back. There they are greeted by a woman who appears to be confused border-line insanity. They get an embrocation from the store to treat a wound on the horse, then she suggests giving them dinner and eventually staying for the night. Jo and Jim joke about the woman referring to how she knows 'how to kiss one hundred different ways'.

The narrator bathes in the river.

Discovers that the woman has attempted to make herself look pretty by putting on rouge and a different dress. Jo has combed back his hair, shaved, and changed. They start to get drunk and Jo and The Woman start 'kissing feet' under the table, slowly growing closer as they get more intoxicated.

The woman reveals that her husband often beats her, forces sex on her, goes away often shearing and that she is alone and isolated living in poverty. She then leaves and comes back and then goes off again.

The woman's daughter then does a drawing of a woman pointing a gun at a man, intimating that her mother killed her father. Jim and the narrator see the drawing, stay up all night in shock and then leave in the morning without Jo who has spent the night in the womans bed.

[edit] Characters

Jo He implies that even if the woman does not consent to sex, he will still have sexual relations with her. He is sleazy and a very creepy character. He talks using slang.
Jim Not as bad as Jo but still refers to the woman as 'that old bitch'
The narrator The other woman in the story it is apparent she would not make a suitable mother because she treats the womans daughter with disgust and no understanding of why she is like she is.
The woman at the store. She was a barmaid until she got married. She has killed her husband. She has had many miscarriages and suffered from emotional and physical abuse by her husband who she claims 'spoilt' and 'stole' her beauty, youth and innocence.
The woman's young daughter. She likes drawing. She has been neglected by her mother and as a result has no manners and doesn't know how to behave. She plays in the dirt, picks earwax from her ears and spies on the narrator whilst she is bathing.

[edit] Major themes

Loneliness
Isolation in the New Zealand country side
New Zealand's relationship with Britain. New Zealand was viewed as Britain's 'little farm'
Womans rights and how they were abused
The idea of how woman were expected to have children even if they weren't suited to motherhood