本文是一篇英语论文，凯瑟琳·曼斯菲尔德（Katherine Mansfield）的作品邀请了不同程度的后殖民阅读。作为一名在被殖民的新西兰长大并搬到欧洲生活的作家，曼斯菲尔德在作品中反思了帝国主体和被殖民的他者之间的复杂关系。与许多倾向于采取欧洲中心主义立场的西方作家不同，曼斯菲尔德更关心被边缘化的毛利人的存在。
Chapter OneThe Maori’s Predicament in New Zealand
1.1 Pakeha’s Appropriation of the Maoriland
The 19th and early 20th centuries saw conflicts and violence between the Maori and the Pakeha in New Zealand.When the Pakeha population came to equal that ofthe Maori in the 19th century,they were hungry for more land.In this case,they beganto transact with the Maori for land on a large scale.The Government encouraged thesale of land from individual Maoris who,by tribal tradition,had no right to sell it.“Since the early 1840s,they’d[Maoris]been under growing pressure to sell their landto settlers”(Keenan 63).To strengthen their status and prevent the further sale of land,about 540 Maori chiefs signed Treaty of Waitangi with the British Crown in February1840.It is often considered to be New Zealand’s founding document.
According to the English version of the Treaty,the Maori gave the Crown theright to buy Maoriland they wished to sell,and in return,they were guaranteed fullrights of ownership of the Maoriland,forests and other resources.However,many ofthe rights promised to the Maori were ignored.The British settlers constantly pressedthe local government,asking to take possession of more Maoriland.Gradually,moreand more Maori people felt threatened by Western imperialism and were unwilling tosell their land to British settlers.In this context,the Maori began to rebel and therearose the King Movement and the Maori wars that lasted for nearly three decades.TheMaori suffered heavy casualties and large areas of their land were subsequentlyconfiscated.
1.2 Pakeha’s Social Rejection of the Maori
Katherine Mansfield started to write about New Zealand in the hope that shecould make the“undiscovered country leap into the eyes of the Old world”(Notebooks2 32).Yet she did not confine her writings to the experiences of theupper-middle class only.In her writings,she expressed her critical view of NewZealand’s colonial past and her sympathy for the poor people,including both the poorwhite and the Maori.
In colonial New Zealand,prejudice against the Maori was commonplace amongthe Pakeha population.When the Maoriland was appropriated by the Pakeha,theMaori had to change their traditional way of life to integrate into the white communityand some Maoris were gradually assimilated by European culture.With the Europeanmissionaries preaching their religion,some Maoris began to worship Christianity.They wore modern European dress when they took part in Christian activities,whichwas an essential prerequisite for becoming Christian New Zealanders.Mansfieldrecorded in her notebooks how she and her classmates sewed cheap chemises for the Maori Mission at school:
They are as long as nightdresses,very full,with huge armholes and a plain bandround the neck—not even a lace edging.Those poor Maoris.They can’t all be asfat as these chemises!But Mrs.Wallis,the Bishop’s wife,said when she gavethe newspaper pattern to the headmistress‘It is wiser to reckon on them beingfat’.(Notebooks2 25-6)
Chapter TwoMansfield’s Subversion of the Stereotyped Maori Image
2.1 Image of“Cannibals”in Literary Tradition
In early colonial literature,Maori characters were usually portrayed in anegative light.These works were“markedly ideological and selective(evenrepressive)”(Said,Culture 166)in their representations of the indigenous people.Theunderlying ratiocination was that the colonizers tried to legalize and justify their colonial practices and oppression by demeaning the image of the Maori.Thus,in theearly stages of colonization,some voyage diaries began to portray the indigenouspeople as savage,brutal“cannibals”who needed to be civilized and saved by thecolonizers.These works laid the foundation for later colonial expansion.
In the 18th century,before the British settled in New Zealand,Captain Cook,afamous navigator of the Royal Navy,l
