Bliss

Bliss is a modernistshort story by Katherine Mansfield, first published in 1920. It was first published in the English Review in August 1918 and later reprinted in Bliss and Other Stories.

The story follows a day in the life of its main character, Bertha, in Hampstead, London. She feels blissful and experiences her whole existence as perfect while at the same time seeming childish and naive. On this particular day, Bertha has invited friends for dinner. The dinner guests are characterized as shallow and vain by their small talk. At the end of the story, when the guests leave, Bertha discovers that her husband is having an affair with one of her dinner guests, Pearl Fulton.

Characters in "Bliss"

  • Bertha Young, the main character, age 30. She is depicted as being extremely naïve but happy. The reader is bound to sympathize with her, because she is the only character in the story who seems to have genuine feelings towards somebody else. The presence of servants in Harry's and Bertha's house implies that the couple is part of the upper class.
  • Harry, Bertha's husband. Like most characters, he is characterized only through Bertha's thoughts towards him. At the end of the story it becomes clear that her view of him was not entirely accurate.
  • Little Bertha/Little B, Bertha's baby daughter
  • Mary - servant
  • Nurse - Little B's nanny

Dinner guests

  • Mr and Mrs Norman Knight: refer to each other when alone or in the company of close friends as "Mug" and "Face"; a playwright and an interior designer, respectively.
  • Eddie Warren: a poet, and an effeminate and possibly homosexual (as well as a bisexual or heterosexual) character.
  • Pearl Fulton: Bertha's new 'find'; an attractive blonde woman who Bertha is immediately drawn to. There is an air of uncertainty about Pearl, though Bertha is not entirely sure what it is that they share which unites them. She later realises it is a desire for Harry, and that Pearl is sharing in Bertha's Bliss. Bertha does not know Pearl very well, but falls in love with her nonetheless (as she always did fall in love with beautiful women who had something strange about them). The language describing social outburst is fitting for a middle-class family that is concerned about image and acceptable behavior.

Pearl is positively characterized by Bertha's thoughts and feelings towards her. Harry seemingly despises her, but since the story is told through the eyes of Bertha, the reader is incapable of seeing Harry's deceit. Bertha possibly has homoerotic feelings towards Pearl, as she reckons that it is Pearl who seems to inspire the bliss within her, and also the newfound sexual desire towards her own husband.