Mansfield’s Short Stories Essay

This member discusses how emotions argon depicted in both Katherine Mansfields piffling stories, pleasure and fetching the head covering. Emotions be mapped with lingual markers such as adjectives and adverbs that imply a voices aflame response to stage events. The study foc expends on fabricatorial conference and distinguishes mingled with verbalized speech and ideal ( b ar substantiating hold forth) and non-verbalised thought- summonses (psycho-narration). The depth psychology is carried stunned by studying the deictic explicate word knowledgeableity or the situation in the short stories. The study shows that passages of psycho-narration and submit corroboratory intervention argon plentiful in frantic language, including such features as interjections, repeating and orthographic markers.1. IntroductionEmotions often play a prodigious role in limning a literary regions wit. This study discusses how in the flesh(predicate)itys emotions be depic ted in two Katherine Mansfields short stories, contentment and Taking the cover.1 The focus is on those partitionings in Mansfields stories that depict personas psyches and vox populis. The outline maps the features that imply the presence of disposition or attitude in Katherine Mansfields texts. The abbreviation is carried out by studying linguistic features such as adjectives, adverbs and orthography to chance upon out whose k ex diversenessable a shotingness and emotions argon depicted in the text. Consciousness report is an umbrella term for several(prenominal) techniques that sh be some communal features in depicting characters sense. This study focuses on the interplay between psycho-narration, the tellers rendering of characters psyches or their non-verbalised thought accomplishes, and loose corroboratory discourse, the vote counters confirmatory quotation of the row that the characters state or think, their verbalised speech or thought. Both ingesty in convey discourse and psycho-narration depict character speech at heart the framework of tierce individual floor, and in Mansfields stories characters touchs ar often filtered by the narrators discourse .2 There are withal feelings that the characters whitethorn be unaware of but that the narrator reports to the preserveee. For this reason, the focus of the study is on the narrators chin wag of characters emotions, as psycho-narration and allay col novelral discourse are narrators discourse by nature. The divergencys between psycho-narration and free corroborative discourse are illustrated in an some other(a) drill from Mansfield, a fiction called The razzings folk (see sub subsection 2.3). In analysing characters emotions status plays an important role. Perspective tells the reader whose halt of view is adopted in the text. Perspective is realised through visuo-spatial or temporal indicators that are in addition called deictic features (see subsection 2.1). The starting aim of the abridgment is to nail the deictic features that imply the presence of consciousness or emotional involvement in satisfaction and Taking the Veil. The second aim is to study consciousness report that is often marked by reporting devices such as appraising(prenominal) adjectives and adverbs, or other side-building elements such as backshifting of deforms and orthographic markers.The analysis is based on linguistic evidence in sections of psycho-narration or free verificatory discourse with reference to characters emotions and emotional switch overs. When a fictional characters feelings change, the readers may excessively change their views of that character (Miall and Kuiken 2001 291). Thus, changing emotions make the readers interpretation of the story. The next section takes a next look at the linguistic features that indicate characters emotions depicted in psycho-narration and free verifying discourse. 2. Linguistic Features in the Re playation of Character Emotions This section discusses linguistic features that imply psycho-narration and free indirect discourse. In the prefatory subsection, the connection between the deictic heart and soul and emotions is explained. The second subsection takes a look at specific reporting devices and features that indicate a deictic centre. In the trey gear part, psycho-narration and free indirect discourse are discussed with events from Mansfields Dolls House.2.1 Deixis and Deictic CentreEmotions are an essential part of depicting a literary characters consciousness. In analysing emotions or characters consciousness deixis is a useful tool. Deixis means features of language which fasten voices temporally or spatially here, today (Hawthorn 1994 37). Consciousness mystifyation be follows apparent through many indicators, most clearly through orthographic markers such as quotation tag or words in italics. Orthographic markers are especially used in direct discourse where quotation attach show the beginning and ending of a dialogue. Parentheticals or brackets indicating the speaker and his or her act of speaking or thinking within a article of faith, for mannequin, she say or he thought are also used in direct discourse to indicate the speaking or thinking person. As these markers seldom occur in consciousness report, however, there are other markers homogeneous expressive elements that help to identify the consciousness and emotions in an extract. Thus, linguistic analysis helps to find out which features refer to which character. Studying linguistic features is a key element in analyzing the deictic centre of the short stories in this paper. In the English language, deixis represents of features that indicate a infixed deictic centre (Fludernik 1993 6).The features complicate ad hominem pronouns, for example I, you,it spatial and temporal adverbs such as left, in front of, ten years ago verbal categories indicating hold like come and go relationa l designations implying emotional involvement, for typeface the antagonist or darling and terms of endearment, such as sweetheart and mummy, which also suggest that the speakers feelings are involved. A nonher way to spot a perspective is to study lexical, mulish, syntactic and morphological features indicating consciousness report. Deixis and subjective elements play a crucial role in analysing the material of this paper. The two other types of deixis are discourse/text deixis and amicable deixis (cf. Levinson 1983). Discourse deixis or text deixis refers to parts of unfolding discourse in which the utterance is located, for instance that in the following example Puff puff puff That is what it sounded like. accessible deixis encodes the affectionate status and aspects of neighborly relationships between speakers and addressees My married man and I are both teachers, and so is my father (Levinson 1983 62-63).Deixis is unremarkably organised in an self-absorbed way. The dei ctic context is speaker-based and centred upon the speakers here-and- straight (Lyons 1981 230). People are more than apt to refer to their own view identify in discussions and prefer proximal personal expressions, such as the pronoun I, or place indexicals, such as here, to distal expressions like he or there. We stinkpot buoy also blabber just about a deictic centre, meaning the perspective of the discourse histrion from which utterances are delivered (Levinson 1983 63-64, Yule 1996 9). There are five unmarked anchorage points that live the deictic centre (Levinson 1983 64). They consist of the speaker who is the central person in books usually the protagonist, the narrator or some other character and of the central place which refers to the speakers location at utterance term.The third anchorage point of the deictic centre is the central time, the time when the speaker produces the utterance. Fourth, the discourse centre is the speakers current point during the product ion of his or her utterance. Thus, the discourse centre changes from one person to other when the producer of the utterance changes. And last, the social centre is the speakers social status and rank to which the addressee or referents status is sexual relation (Yule 1996 10). A nonher common deictic phenomenon in language is the transference of compassionate body orientation (Fludernik 1993 49).This method is used extensively in literature to create the illusion of naturalness. When an author uses this technique in a literary text, he or she describes an event, a phenomenon or space from a authorized physical viewpoint that demands the readers body orientation, as in the sentence There was a c whisker to the left (Fludernik 1993 49). To sum up, literary texts create a humanness of their own, including their own deictic structure. In best floors, the reader has the apprehension of experiencing the fictional founding directly, because he or she adopts the deictic centre as hi s or her own (cf. Banfield 1982, Zubin and Hewitt 1995 131).2.2 Reporting DevicesThis section divulges other linguistic features that are used in creating deictic centres in narratives. The devices consist of backshifting of distorts and other perspective-building elements, such as adjectives and adverbs, orthographic markers and textual coherence. The first device, backshifting of tenses, is connected with the was-now paradox, an especially interesting feature in literature. The was encodes the narrator in the process of narrating, introducing the fictional world mode to the reader. The now encodes the protagonist for whom the story world events are part of the current experience (cf. Adamson 1994). Mansfield sometimes uses the present tense in her stories, which attracts the readers attention and raises the question of why the was-now doctrine is violated. The change in tenses suggests a change in perspectives, including a change in the feeling experience of the storys charact ers. The implications of these linguistic devices for the characters emotional world are discussed in section 3. In the analysis of the deictic centre and literary figures emotions, adjectives and adverbs sometimes stick out a signifi preemptt meaning.I apply Biber, Conrad and Leechs (2002) classification of adjectives and adverbs in this study. Descriptive adjectives or descriptors often imply consciousness report when they co-occur with other deictic elements such as place and time deixis. Evaluative/emotive (dreadful) and multifaceted descriptors covering many physical bodys of characteristics (sudden) suggest consciousness report in narratives and need to be studied to reckoning the source of emotions in a literary text. Descriptive adjectives give personal flavour to the text, but the reader has to dissolve whether descriptors refer to the narrators or some characters emotions. Sometimes it may be very difficult to distinguish contrasting sources of emotion from each oth er, as examples from Mansfields stories show (see section 3). In the analysis of Mansfields texts, degree adverbs and stance adverbs receive special attention. story adverbs like amplifiers/ intensifiers (generously) and diminishers/ piletoners (somewhat) as well as stance adverbs, such as attitude (unfortunately), epistemic (probably) and style stance adverbs (simply) are discussed in the analysis of the material, as are place, time and process adverbials. Of place adverbials, those of remoteness (a keen-sighted way), direction (from within) and position (up there) often imply whose perspective is adopted in the story. Additionally, such time adverbials as point in time (tomorrow night), season (for fifteen years), frequency (sometimes) and time relationship ( later on this) indicate the source of consciousness.The process of action described in stories provides the reader with valuable information on the events and characters. Manner adverbials (carelessly) are often used espe cially by mod authors to describe characters behaviour. Degree adverbials (e.g. very such(prenominal), deally) are often used to attach characters emotions and to describe their emotional response to story events. Adjectives and adverbs are elements in constructing perspective in a narrative. They help the reader to respond to the feeling experiences of a character that are embodied in the stylistic and linguistic devices of a text (Miall and Kuiken 2001 292). The following subchapter discusses the connection between linguistic features and feeling experiences in psycho-narration and free indirect discourse.2.3 Psycho-narration and Free Indirect DiscourseIn this section the features of psycho-narration and free indirect discourse are discussed with examples from Mansfields story The Dolls House. Special attention is paid to linguistic devices that gage the interpretation of psycho-narration or free indirect discourse in a textual passage. Psycho-narration is the narrators prese ntation of a characters psyche. Its main focus is on a characters thoughts and feelings and it is outlined in terms of deictic qualities (Fludernik 1993 304).3 Psycho-narration reports those feelings or states of consciousness that the character may be unaware of. Psycho-narration has almost unlimited temporal flexibility (Cohn 1978 32), so it can occur both in the present and the past tense. The analysis of Mansfields works shows the temporal varieties of psycho-narration. Free indirect discourse consists of expressions or utterances that could be produced by the characters as such or with minor alterations, like the use of the preterite instead of the present tense.4 In free indirect discourse the narrator quotes the speech or thought of the protagonist or other characters.Direct discourse and free indirect discourse shed common features such as deictics, word order in questions and lexical elements including vocatives, interjections, or dialectal features (cf. Fludernik 1993 261 ). In order to retain proximity, proximal deictics likehere, now and today occur in free indirect discourse. The question word order remains direct in free indirect discourse. This narrative technique also favours expressive lexical elements from characters idiolects to give the narration personal flavour. McHale (1978 269) aptly remarks that formal signs are not the only means to trace free indirect discourse, since semantic signs such as the content of utterances, and a characters thoughts or intended meanings also contribute to the readers interpretation of free indirect discourse. The terms psycho-narration and free indirect discourse overlap to some extent. The former borrows elements from the speech of characters, but a character could hardly use the (narrators) syntax as such. To demonstrate the difference between the unlike consciousness report techniques, I have elect an extract from Katherine Mansfields story The Dolls House. It is a story about middle-class disembodied spirit and the Burnell children, and how they invite classmates of the same social class to see their new dolls hall.Lower-class children are not invited, until one of the daughters, Kezia, defies her parents and asks the Kelvey girls, the daughters of a washerwoman, to see the house. The following extract depicts Kezias aunts reaction when she sees the unwelcome children in the garden. (1)Wicked, disobedient niggling(a) girl said Aunt Beryl bitterly to Kezia, and she slammed the dolls house to. The afternoon had been awful. A letter had come from Willie Brent, a terrifying, threateningletter, saying if she did not meet him that evening in Pulmans Bush, hed come to the front door and ask the reason why But now that she had frightened those little rats of Kelveys and given Kezia a undecomposed scolding, her heart mat lighter. That dismal pressure was gone. She went back to the house humming. (The Dolls House, 265 furiousness added) example (1) is a description of Aunt Beryls consciousness presentation after she has scolded her niece and her friends in the courtyard.After the quotation in direct discourse, Aunt Beryls perspective (in bold type) is familiarised in the first sentences as a flashback, the past perfect verb form had come implying a forepart towards Aunt Beryl, come universe a verb suggesting proximal activity. Even though Beryls name is not mentioned in the whole carve up, she is the subject of the sentence starting the quotation and the most recent character mentioned earlier in the text. Aunt Beryl and the third person reference to her (she) in the quotation can be seen as an example of referential linking which is an important f faker in maintaining textual cohesion in the depiction of characters emotions (cf. Ehrlich 1990). Descriptive adjectives likeawful, terrifying and threatening, and noun styles like those little rats of Kelveys depict Beryls feelings, the distal demonstrative pronoun those and the descriptive noun phrase littl e rats of Kelveys underlining the contempt of upper classes towards lower-class passel and the social distance between Beryl and the Kelveys.The distal demonstrative determiner that and the proximal temporal adverb now illustrate how proximal and distal linguistic features are mixed in psycho-narration, suggesting a transition from Aunt Beryls earlier emotional agitation caused by her buffers letter to her present state of mind (her heart felt lighter. That ghastly pressure was gone). There is also Willie Brents perspective occurring in the extract (in italics). It has elements of free indirect discourse including past tense verb forms, third person pronouns, orthographic markers and a colloquial tone. The past perfect verb form changes into the past tense did not meet, which is followed by hed come. An exclamation mark finishes the free indirect discourse passage which is reflected through Beryls consciousness in the depot of the letter. The final sentence is the narrators neutr al report of the narrative events.3. Emotional Features in Mansfields StoriesPsycho-narration and free indirect discourse are ways of presenting characters emotions to readers. In this section, Katherine Mansfields stories joy and Taking the Veil are analysed in order to find linguistic features that suggest a characters emotional involvement. Mansfield uses psycho-narration and free indirect discourse in pleasure and Taking the Veil. In the analysis of the texts, underlined words point out subjective features and fragments of characters idiom. Some quotations from Mansfields short stories are integrated into the analysis for a more convenient discussion of the context. Bliss is a story of a wealthy young couple, Bertha and Harry, and their social life. In Bliss, psycho-narrative description is dumb for Berthas feelings of bliss, her relationship with Harry-the-husband, and her feelings towards their friends. The dissevers that include psycho-narration often start with inert na rratorial description. The shift from the narrators perspective to that of the character takes place within dissever boundaries, as the following examples show.The first paragraph of Bliss introduces corporations expectations of 30-year-old womens behaviour. The narrator implies that Berthas thoughts and feelings are quite olympian for her age (2) Although Bertha Young was thirty she still had outcomes like this when she wanted to run instead of walk, to take dancing steps on and off the pavement, to bankroll a hoop, to throw something up in the air and catch it again, or to stand still and laugh at nothing at nothing, simply. (Bliss, 91 emphasis added) The narrator adopts an omniscient perspective she knows exactly how Bertha is feeling and what she feels like doing. The readers attention is directed towards the protagonists perspective through the use of the demonstrative this, symbolising the here-and-now narrative present, Berthas present state of mind. The italicised wor ds imply Berthas wishes. The narrators speech presents societys expectations at the beginning of example (2) (although,still) and Berthas own thoughts at the end of it (nothing at nothing, simply).The phenomenon of Ansteckung is apparent in the fragments of Berthas idiom. Ansteckungmeans the narrators empathetic or ironic borrowing of characters idioms or expressions (cf. Fludernik (1993) for examples of Ansteckung or contamination). Fragments of Berthas consciousness are not complete thoughts or words uttered by her. When it comes to Berthas psyche, the narrator seems to be aware of it, depicting elements of Berthas thoughts at the end of example (2) (see the words in bold). It is obvious in the last sentence of example (2) dashes have words Berthas consciousness. She is incapable of finding suitable words for the peculiar feeling the impression is increased by the repeated words at nothing. The rig of immediacy is created by hints of Berthas psyche within narratorial discourse, suggesting that after the first part of the sentence the writer resorts to free indirect discourse at the end of the passage.There are two longer paragraphs of psycho-narration in Bliss. They discuss Berthas situation in life and her relationship with Harry. The first paragraph reads as follows (3) Really very she had everything. She was young. Harry and she were as much in passionateness as ever, and they got on together splendidly and were really good pals. She had anadorable baby. They didnt have to worry about money. They had this absolutely passing(prenominal) house and garden. And friends modern, thrilling friends, writers andpainters and poets or people keen on social questions just the kind of friends they wanted. And then there were books, and there was music, and she had found a wonderful little dressmaker, and they were going abroad in the summer, and their new bullshit made the most superb omelettes (Bliss, 96 emphasis added) Example (3) starts in free indirect discourse and shows many syntactic markers that imply consciousness report, such as the epistemic stance adverb really, the proximal deictic thisindicating Berthas spatial perspective, and the frequent use of and acting as a clause-initial co-ordinating conjunction and creating the illusion of Berthas happy thoughts. Other features include pragmatic indicators, such as dashes, and lexical features, for example idioms (really good pals), phrases or descriptive adjectives (absolutely satisfactory, adorable, modern, thrilling, wonderful little etc.) borrowed from Bertha.As Fludernik (1993 117) suggests, referential positions are often shifted into the third person in heterodiegetic narratives, excluding second person narratives. This extract is a good example of such a referential shift in personal pronouns, as it contains only the third person she instead of the first person I. Example (3) describes a happy woman counting her blessings. Another paragraph reflects the problems Bertha encounters in her marriage (4) Oh, she had get byd him shed been in love with him, of course, in every other way, butjust not in that way. And equally, of course, shed understood that he was different. Theyd discussed it so often. It had worried her dreadfully at first to find that she was so cold, but after a time it had not seemed to matter. They were so frank with each other such good pals. That was the best of being modern. (Bliss, 104 emphasis added) The extract leads readers into Berthas consciousness with the clause-initial interjection ohsuggesting free indirect discourse. Repetitive elements, such as of course and the intensifierso, emphasise the impression of Bertha rationalising her marriage to Harry.The sentence-initial and helps her to articulate her understanding of Harry and his different feelings on the topic, as she is negotiating the good and bad things about her marriage in her mind. There are also some lexical indications of consciousness report, such as just, the intensifier such, anddreadfully, a colloquialism only to be attached to Berthas consciousness. These emotive features create an impression of Berthas inner conflict and the suppression of her feelings, which is manifest throughout the story.5 Taking the Veil is a story about Edna and her lover horn in, and Ednas dreams of congruous a nun. In Taking the Veil, psycho-narration is reserved for Ednas internal fence and her memories of the crisis of her life. A typical example is a theatre scene, where Edna goes through the happenings of the previous night (5) The play had begun fairly cheerfully. That was at the chocolate almond stage. Then the hero had gone blind. Terrible moment Then there had been that ghastly scene with the hero alone on stage in a deserted roomHe had essay ah, how painfully, how pitifully to grope his way to the windowand the band faded aside into the distance. (Taking the Veil, 284 emphasis added) Example (5) shows how Mansfield uses distal deictics li ke that (in that ghastly scene) to imply Ednas perspective by creating a personal tone.Additionally, she uses the evaluative adjectives terrible and ghastly to refer to Ednas emotional response. The repetitive strain in the exclamations above (in bold type) is separated from the rest of the psycho-narration by dashes and underscore by other orthographic signals, such as exclamation marks. An introductory exclamation ah adds to the colloquial tone, as does the repetition of the wh-element how. Mansfield often uses clause-initial wh-elements in exclamations to introduce free indirect discourse in the telling (Kuivalainen 2005). These features contain elements representative of speech rather than thought. The impression in this extract is that of narratorial discourse flavoured by free indirect discourse (in bold type). Psycho-narration continues when the narrator describes Ednas internal debate (6) If she did not marry Jimmy, of course she would marry nobody. The man she was in love with, the famous actor Edna had far too much common-sense not to realise thatwould never be. It was very odd. She didnt even want it to be. Her love was too intense for that. It had to be endured, silently it had to torment her.It was, she supposed, simply that kind of love. (Taking the Veil, 285 italics original, emphasis added) The extract above shows how Edna debates her love for Jimmy, her fianc, and for the actor she has fallen in love with. The words in bold include an attitude stance adverb of course, a comment on a realistic marriage with the famous actor, and a distal pronoun that. All these elements imply a reference to Ednas perspective which, however, intermingles with that of the narrator after the dash on the second line. Ednas emotional perspective, the vacillating feelings she suddenly faces in the story, re-occurs with the comment on the nature of her love (It was very odd) and remains unaltered till the end of the extract, with another comment at the end of the paragraph introduced by the style stance adverb simply. The extract above shows the subtlety of the change from one perspective to another at the beginning we only have a personal pronoun reference to the speaker, but later the protagonists proper(ip) name is used to help the reader realise the change, to introduce the perspective of the narrator penetrating that of Edna. The effect is that of immediate access to the characters thoughts and feelings.In the paragraph preceding example (6) the closest proper noun is Sister Agnes. However, the reader does not connect the personal pronoun she in example (6) with Sister Agnes but with Edna, who is mentioned earlier in the text, because semantic connectors such as marriage and Jimmy imply her. The narrators statement-like comment after the dash supports this interpretation. However, this sentence is affected by Ednas idiom, the use of that(in italics) emphasising the impossibleness of the suggestion of love for an actress. Ednas eighteen -year-old girls voice is also heard at the end of the paragraph with the simply that kind of love quotation of Ednas thoughts. As example (6) suggests, psycho-narration at the beginning of the paragraph depicts Ednas feelings from her perspective, but later the narrators perspective becomes predominate in the example, providing the reader with an external perspective to Ednas love life. A drastic change in psycho-narration happens when the tenses change from the past to the present. This change implies a shift from the past or present events to the future.(7) She takes the name of Sister Angela. Snip, cartridge clip All her lovely hair is cut offAnd in a blue gown with a white head-band Sister Angela goes from the convent to the chapel, from the chapel to the convent she greets the little children who run to her. A enshrine She hears it whispered as she paces the chill, wax-smelling corridors. A saint (Taking the Veil, 286 emphasis added) The extract above shows how Edna dreams a bout the life of a nun and imagines her future as Sister Angela. The short onomatopoeical snip and the repetition of a saint, both ending with an exclamation mark, refer to Ednas imagination. Her emotional involvement shows in the sacrifices she makes (All her lovely hair is cut off) and in the description of the new environment she enters (chill, wax-smelling corridors). The present tense adds to the effect. It is used throughout the passage to relate Ednas convent dreams, as another quotation below shows (8) Now it is evening.Two old people leaning on each other come slowly to the solemnNow there comes another. He is all in black he comes slowly. But when he is there and lifts his black hat, Edna sees to her horror his hair is snow-white. Jimmy Too late, too late The tears are running down his face he is crying now. Too late, too late(ibid. 287 italics original, emphasis added) In example (8), the same elements of exclamatory repetition too late and the present tense are used to depict Ednas reveries about the future. Additionally, immediacy is emphasised with the temporal proximal deictic now, a favorite(a) of Mansfields in this story, and the present continuous are running and is crying. The use of present continuous verb forms and the proximal deictic now mark Ednas psychological crisis, which culminates at the end of example (8) and ends the sections in the present tense. The non-use of the was-now chassis reflects a change in perspective from the narrator to Edna in example (8), as the sections that do not imply Ednas consciousness in Taking the Veil are written in the past tense (see example (5)). When the paragraph after example (8) begins, Edna has changed her mind about becoming a nun and realised she actually loves Jimmy.4. DiscussionBliss and Taking the Veil consist of a mixture of speech and thought report. It is marked in these works that, as a narrative technique, free indirect discourse is clearly separated from psycho-narration. The shif t from psycho-narration into free indirect discourse and then back to psycho-narration can be found in Bliss and Taking the Veil, as the linguistic analysis of characters emotions showed in section three. The reverie-like atmosphere of Taking the Veil is strikingly different from the passionate, hectic humour in Bliss, where the narrator first describes the setting for the psychological phenomena, Berthas mixed feelings about her marriage, and then resorts to consciousness presentation. In Taking the Veil the narrators function is to offer the reader an insight into Ednas mind generally through psycho-narration, thus, psycho-narrative passages begin with narratorial description which introduces Ednas mental world to the reader. Psycho-narration serves to depict the protagonists internal debate example (5) depicts the crucial moment of the past in the past tense and example (7) future dreams in the present tense.On the other hand, free indirect discourse in example (5) helps in cre ating sensual perceptions that present a contrast to Ednas inner thoughts. Passages in free indirect discourse often start with a clause-initial coordinator (and), interjection (oh) or a wh-element (how) and can be spotted from the rest of the narration through orthography, like dashes meet the free indirect discourse passage, exclamation or question marks. Mansfield frequently uses italics and ellipses in reporting characters consciousness and feelings, which gives the impression of free indirect discourse. drawn-out use of stance adverbs is striking in the two stories. A common feature in Mansfields psycho-narration is the adoption of epistemic stance adverbs such as really in example (3).6In Bliss and Taking the Veil, the interplay between the two dominant voices, that of the narrator and the protagonist, becomes evident through the rich use of stance adverbs. The narrators perspective is mostly introduced through epistemic adverbs indicating certainty or doubt (e.g. perhaps), whereas the protagonists perspective mostly consists of those of actuality and reality (e.g. in fact, really). The effect is a narrator with no intention to intrude upon the story events, and a protagonist with a intelligibly marked emotional world including feelings of bliss, future dreams, and moments of despair and love.Mansfields narrator steers the reader towards the protagonists climax with subtle remarks and hardly perceptible hints. Psycho-narration demonstrates different functions in the texts of this study. Mansfield uses evaluative and emotive descriptors in psycho-narrative sections she borrows characters idiomatic expressions and marks internal discourse with orthography (dashes, exclamation marks), intensifiers and repetition to imply a shift from one perspective or feeling experience to another, for example, from the narrator to the protagonist. Mansfield describes the inner conflict or the dream world of the characters through psycho-narration, which is usually tr iggered by an emotional climax, in Berthas case the revelation of her husbands adultery and in Ednas case understanding who she really loves. In Mansfields fiction, the climax almost has a hallucinatory effect, as Ednas convent dreams and the graveyard scene in example (8) show.The use of the present tense seems to have a role in Mansfields text. Mansfield uses it mostly in psycho-narrative sections. All in all, there are certain features that are used frequently in Mansfields stories, such as dashes, repetition of adverbs or other clausal elements like intensifiers, interjections or co-ordinators. Temporal and spatial deictics have a significant role in the two stories, as the reader has very few other means to orient him- or herself while reading a literary text. Deictics help the reader to pinpoint the perspective in the passage and understand whose experiences are depicted in the story. The study of the deictic features in Mansfields fictional prose shows that the author uses va rious markers to create a deictic centre. These markers create a picture of characters emotional world.Free indirect discourse and psycho-narration are motivated, for example, by an internal debate or a crisis, as Ednas ponderings showed in example (8). As was suggested in the analysis, linguistic features such as reporting devices and deictic features can be used to pinpoint the source of emotions in a literary text. Verbs, adjectives, adverbs and other consciousness markers work for the same effect, to describe the emotional world of characters. Psycho-narration and free indirect discourse provide Mansfield with a tool to point out the significant moments in the protagonists lives and separate them from the rest of the narration. Mansfield is the master of her characters and their emotions, do them breathe and feel as if they really existed.