The main purpose of this dissertation will be the analysis of two short stories included in Katherine Mansfield’s Bliss and Other Stories (1920): “Bliss” and “Prelude. The main aim will be to analyse both stories from a feminist perspective, that is, by making use of the methodology of feminist narratology developed by important theorists such as Susan Lanser or Judith Butler, this paper will show the importance of the issue of gender in Mansfield’s short stories. More specifically, this thesis will be based on exploring the dichotomy encapsulated by female characters regarding two main notions which will be: womanhood and sexuality. In order to carry out the analysis of the two notions aforementioned, this paper will focus on feminist theories and on the analysis of recurrent Modernist techniques such as the importance of the character’s inner consciousness or the role of symbolism, since they contribute significantly to bringing female characters to the very front of the narrative and therefore, adding a great dimension of feminist depth into the short stories. Through this analysis, we will be able to establish a parallelism between the situation of women in the twentieth century and the portrayal and disposition of female characters in both stories, leading to a critique against the traditional patriarchal ideology which concludes with the possible liberation of these women through the symbolism of natural elements. <br /
