Drabble on Mansfield
I first read "The Doll's House" in one of those big children's annuals that we were given every Christmas, where this classic story took its place among puzzles, Christmas games and jolly messages from Enid Blyton. I can remember the illustrations now, and how fascinated I was by the strange name of Kezia. I found it heartbreaking then and I still do. Every child dreads being the playground victim, the one whose family is an embarrassment or a source of shame, and this story encapsulates that sense of exclusion. In true Mansfield style, it is at once pathetic (in the true sense) and slightly sadistic.
When one is older one can appreciate the economy of the narration, the symbolism of the doll's house, the bloody horror of the leaking jam sandwiches, the subtle relationship of the two sisters and the snobbery of the adults, but it is the unbearable poignancy of that last line, "I seen the little lamp", that continues to haunt. I still have dreams about being shunned in the playground or ignored at a party or finding no place at a dinner table. I think many of us do. Mansfield cruelly nails this vulnerability and makes us suffer all over again. She was not a kind or gentle writer. This story could be sentimental in the hands of a lesser writer, but she knew better than that. She spares nobody.
