Powers of Disgust: Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf

Abstract

Woolf and Mansfield are often noted for their lyricism, but they also share a powerful undercurrent of disgust. This essay considers how recent theories of disgust pertain to their writing, especially to Mansfield’s In a German Pension and Woolf’s The Years. It concludes with a comparison of two short stories, Woolf’s “The Duchess and the Jeweller” (1938) and Mansfield’s ‘Je ne parle pas français’, which have aroused disgusted reactions in their readers.