Encountering the Other: Katherine Mansfield’s Representation of Maori People Erika Otani Introduction Katherine Mansfield, who was born in Wellington, New Zealand, is now generally regarded as one of the greatest modernist writers. Her mature works such as “The Garden-Party” and “At the Bay” set in Wellington have been highly praised for their innovative literary style. It is often said that the time of her apprenticeship was over when she completed “Prelude.” Her works prior to “Prelude” have often been viewed just as the immature works of her apprenticeship or a marginal part of her oeuvre. However, some of the works of her apprenticeship were also located in colonial New Zealand, and her early colonial stories such as “The Woman at the Store,” “Millie,” “Ole Underwood” and “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped” have recently begun to receive more critical attention and be examined from new perspectives (e.g. feminism and colonialism/post-colonialism). Even though Mansfield’s mature stories did not feature the Maori as the theme, the Maori sometimes appeared in her early stories. One of these stories is her 1910 short story, “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped,” which appeared in Rhythm in 1912. In “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped,” the protagonist, Pearl Button, encounters the cultural and ethnic Other – the Maori – and is emancipated by them. However, at the end of the story, the arrival of “little men in blue coats” suggests that they carry her back to her home (523) and her freedom and happiness will be confined again. It is clear that Maori people are portrayed in a positive light, and Mansfield criticizes Pakeha (i.e., white) settler society’s values and lives in this story. It is often pointed out that Maori people are associated with freedom and happiness, while Pakeha with regimentation 南半球評論 6 2017 and dullness. In addition to this common interpretation, some critics have interpreted this story from different perspectives. For example, Pamela Dunbar points out that Mansfield portrays a child’s alienation from her family and the social position of the Maori in this story (43). Lydia Wevers suggests that Mansfield subverts the convention and structure of the colonial romance about a child who is kidnapped by indigenous people (259). However, little attention has been paid to the fact that Mansfield more or less shared the common presumption that Maori people were dying out, and she did not completely rebel against racial bias. Especially, we can find Mansfield’s ambivalent attitude toward the Maori in The Urewera Notebook (2015), which was transcribed from Mansfield’s account of her 1907 journey into the Ureweras, the North Island of New Zealand, by Anna Plumridge.1 Ian A. Gordon suggests that Mansfield used this travel experience in the Urewera district to write “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped” (28-29). Anna Plumridge and Anne Maxwell examine the “Urewera Notebook” in detail, referring to the Urewera district’s colonial history and provide us thought-provoking analyses in terms of Mansfield’s representation of the Maori. However, these two studies did not touch on research of Mansfield’s short stories. If we read Mansfield’s short stories and The Urewera Notebook together, we will clearly understand her relationship with Maori culture and her ambivalent attitude to Maori people. This paper aims to reveal Mansfield’s ambivalent representation of the Maori, by particularly examining what travel experiences she drew on or concealed to create “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped.” This paper first analyzes “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped,” focusing on how Pearl Button departs from Western convention through encountering Maori people. Second, it considers Mansfield’s ambivalent outlook on the Maori by analyzing The Urewera Notebook. Finally, it reveals how Mansfield created “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped,” and her ambivalent descriptions of Maori people in this story are also discussed. 1. Pearl Button and the Other In the opening scene of “How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped,” Pearl plays 2017 7 南半球評論 outside alone. When she swings on “the little gate in front of the House of Boxes” (519), two big dark skinned women appear. Two big women came walking down the street. One was dressed in red and the other was dressed in yellow and green. They had pink handkerchiefs over their heads, and both of them carried a big flax basket of ferns. They had no shoes and stockings on, and they came walking along, slowly, because they were so fat, and talking to each other and always smiling. (519) What the passage makes clear at once is that the two women are described as primitive people, and “always smiling” suggests they are happy. Though this story does not disclose these big women’s race and ethnicity, their appearance and personal belongings lead us to realize they are Maori people. Even though these Maori women are frightened of “the House of Boxes,” they ask Pearl where her mother is. Pearl answers, “In the kitching, ironing- because-its-Tuesday” (520). The phrase “the House of Boxes” is related to the image of confinement. In this confined space, Pearl’s mother is busy with ironing which symbolizes a typical woman’s role in a patriarchal society. As one of the dark women whispers, “We got beautiful things to show you” (520), Pearl decides to get down from the gate and accept their invitation to join them. It implies that Pearl moves from the safe social structure where she belongs. The two women take Pearl to a log house where other dark people welcome her. Other Maori men and women, who also look very happy, do not seem to be engaged in any work. They play with Pearl. When Maori people sit on the dusty floor, Pearl carefully “pull[s] up her pinafore and dress and [sits] on her petticoat” (521) because this is the custom she has been taught to use for sitting in dusty places. She eats a great big peach, “the juice running all down her front” (521). Though she is frightened because she spills the juice, a Maori woman says, “That doesn’t matter at all” (521). Even though Pearl gradually enjoys new values, Pearl still obeys her convention at this point. However, the fact that Pearl spills the peach juice suggests that she symbolically transgresses the boundary between the civilized Pakeha world and the primitive Maori world. After that, Maori people and Pearl go to the sea by carts. As they travel 南半球評論 8 2017 towards the sea, Pearl sits on “the lap of one of her women” (521) and feels a happiness. The word, “her women” suggests the two Maori women are no longer strangers to her. The woman was warm as a cat, and she moved up and down when she breathed, just like purring. Pearl played with a green ornament round her neck, and the woman took the little hand and kissed each of her fingers and then turned it over and kissed the dimples. Pearl had never been happy like this before. (521-22) Since the warmth of the Maori woman’s body is compared to a cat, she is perceived in the image of an animal. We clearly notice that physical contacts like kissing and touching make Pearl happy. What is more, the Maori woman takes off Pearl’s “shoes and stockings, her pinafore and dress” (522) at the house around the sea. Taking off her pinafore and dress means that she removes the customs that she has acquired from established and civilized society. Though Pearl is scared when she sees the sea for the first time, she finally loves the unfamiliar element of the sea. The fact that she rushes over to give one of the Maori women a hug and a kiss shows her excitement. Pearl completely identifies with the Maori tribe. However, her happiness and excitement end at the arrival of little blue men. At first, Pearl has a conventional attitude toward Maori people. However, as she is influenced by the values of the Maori, she questions the values of the established society where white settlers belong. “Haven’t you got any Houses of Boxes?” she [Pearl] said. “Don’t you all live in a row? Don’t the men go to offices? Aren’t there any nasty things?” (522) Through encountering the primitive Other, Pearl questions the white people’s world that is related to an orderly society, a restrictive and regulated life, and a gender role. In this story, Pearl’s father never appears, but Pearl’s questions imply that her father works outside the home as breadwinner. Pearl also thinks that Maori people’s lives are free of nasty things. Maori people are closely associated with freedom and the sea. Mansfield represents Maori people as fat, exotic, rough, and primitive people. As Kate Fullbrook points out, “The 2017 9 南半球評論 world of the ‘dark people’, who are also the ‘people’ of the unconscious, is kind, vivid, open to pleasure, unregulated in the relations between the sexes” (43), it seems reasonable to suppose that through encountering the cultural and ethnic Other – the Maori –Pearl finds not only new values of life but also her repressed sexual desire. 2. Katherine Mansfield and the Other In 1907, Mansfield joined a camping party to travel through a remote and heavily forested part of the North Island of New Zealand. They visited the Urewera area inhabited by the Tuhoe people, one of the Maori tribes. Michael King refers to the Urewera as “the last Maori district to be ‘penetrated’ by Europeans and European influences” (249). Europeans regarded the Tuhoe as “a fierce, untamed race” (Plumridge 7). In this expedition, Mansfield and her tour group also visited other areas like Taupo and Rotorua.