From this anthology of short stories, many lessons can be learnt and each one is entertaining in its own way but the one that stands out is Katherine Mansfield’s Daughters of the Late Colonel.
The first lesson this story teaches is the importance of having a mind of your own. It is the sisters’ lack of decisiveness and a mind of their own that leads to their sad unfulfilment in their lives. Years of dependence on their domineering father has sapped them of any decision-making powers. Their inability to make decisions for themselves are shown when they cannot come to a consensus regarding Kate - “on this one subject I’ve never been able to quite make up my mind” – and their dismay towards their first ever decision of burying father. Helpless without their father to make their decisions for them, both sisters end up being bound forever to the memory of their father and forgetting “what it was (they were) going to say”. They will continue to live in the void created by the demise of their father, never being able to step out.
The second lesson that can be learnt is the effects of parental influence. Throughout the whole story, the huge extent
Another thing which makes readers want to laugh out loud is the fear that the two sisters have of their maid, Kate. The sisters are unable to see that the maid is rightfully under their command and not the other way round. Maids are hired to serve her employers, however, the sisters have strong misgivings about asking anything of Kate, they went through a ridiculously in-depth disscussion of how to ask Kate to bring them two glasses of water, for fear of incurring her wrath. It would not be so funny if the sisters were children, however, when readers remember that the sisters are in fact grown women, it is hard to suppress a laugh. However, it is also tragic that the sisters still allow themselves to be bossed around by someone who is under their employ, their self-confidence has been rendered non-existent by the many years of oppression by their father. It is in this dark and tragic yet subtley humourous way that the story entertains.
Another lesson is how to deal with death. As this story spans “the week after”, we can see how the sisters cope with their sudden loss. However, it is interesting to note that the sisters don’t seem to feel any actual gr
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