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The Fly (short story) Summary
Katherine Mansfield

Everything you need to understand or teach The Fly (short story) by Katherine Mansfield. Products may contain comprehensive summaries, analysis, notes, articles, essays, lesson plans and more. See below for details on what is included.

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Study The Fly (short story)

The The Fly (short story) Study Pack contains about 153 pages of study material in 23 products, including:

Katherine Mansfield Biography (2)

Katherine Mansfield

1,562 words, approx. 6 pages

Short story writer Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) is noted for her short stories with themes relating to women's lives and social hierarchies as well as her sense of wit and characterizations.Katheri... Read more

Katherine Mansfield

11,778 words, approx. 40 pages

Even before she died at the age of thirty-four Katherine Mansfield had achieved a reputation as one of the most talented writers of the modern short story in English. From 1910 publications in periodi... Read more

Essays & Analysis (21)

Critical Essay by Robert Wooster Stallman

563 words, approx. 2 pages

In the following essay, Stallman contends that the theme of Mansfield's “The Fly” is that time overcomes all grief. The experiment with the Fly by the Boss, so named because he ap... Read more

Critical Essay by R. A. Jolly

1,610 words, approx. 6 pages

In the following essay, a response to F. W Bateson's and B. Shahevitch's 1961 essay on “The Fly,” Jolly argues that the story contains many more layers of meaning than thos... Read more

Critical Essay by R. A. Copland

1,048 words, approx. 4 pages

In the following essay, a response to F. W. Bateson's and B. Shahevitch's 1961 essay on “The Fly,” Copland complains that those critics miss the basic point the story, whic... Read more

Critical Essay by E. B. Greenwood

2,446 words, approx. 9 pages

In the following response to F. W. Bateson's and B. Shahevitch's 1961 essay on “The Fly,” Greenwood attacks those critics' conclusions about Mansfield's use o... Read more

Critical Essay by F. W. Bateson

1,653 words, approx. 6 pages

In the following response to the critics E. B. Greenwood, R. A. Copland, and R. W. Jolly, Bateson reasserts his claim that the realistic devices Mansfield uses to describe the character of the boss ma... Read more

Critical Essay by John T. Hagopian

2,900 words, approx. 10 pages

In the following essay, Hagopian rejects biographical interpretations of “The Fly” as limiting the story's universally compelling message of death and loss. Late in 1915 when Kath... Read more

Critical Essay by J. Rea

679 words, approx. 3 pages

In the following essay, Rea concludes that “The Fly” is the story of a selfish man who pushes everyone and everything—except himself—to their breaking point. The chief char... Read more

Critical Essay by Ted E. Boyle

1,417 words, approx. 5 pages

In the following essay, Boyle claims that the symbolism in “The Fly” is intended to emphasize the spiritual death of the boss. John V. Hagopian's recent article on “The Fly... Read more

Critical Essay by Mary Rohrberger

2,224 words, approx. 8 pages

In the following excerpt, Rohrberger claims that all the characters in the story are themselves symbolically flies, each acted upon by a cruel controlling force. “The Fly” was published ... Read more

Critical Essay by Paulette Michel-Michot

3,946 words, approx. 14 pages

In the following essay, Michel-Michot declares that “The Fly” is a story about self-discovery and the resulting terror that forces a man to try to forget the awful truths he has learned ... Read more

Critical Essay by Atul Chandra Chatterjee

905 words, approx. 4 pages

In the following excerpt from his full-length study of Katherine Mansfield, Chatterjee calls “The Fly” a “baffling riddle that lends itself to many conflicting, and, sometimes, fa... Read more

Critical Essay by Wills D. Jacobs

828 words, approx. 3 pages

In the following essay, Jacobs maintains that the fly is a symbol for Mansfield, who at the time of the story's writing was a woman slowly dying of tuberculosis. The interpretation of Katherine... Read more

Critical Essay by Clare Hanson and Andrew Gurr

1,171 words, approx. 4 pages

In the following excerpt from their full-length study of Katherine Mansfield, Hanson and Gurr suggest that the reason “The Fly” has elicited so much critical attention is that the symbol... Read more

Critical Essay by Con Coroneos

1,897 words, approx. 7 pages

In the following essay, Coroneos discusses elements of sadism and ambiguity in “The Fly,” and concludes that this is a war story that encourages the reader to “participate in the ... Read more

Critical Essay by Thomas Bledsoe

615 words, approx. 3 pages

In the following essay, Bledsoe dismisses the interpretations of the story offered the critics Stallman and Jacobs, and concludes that “The Fly” is really about the selfishness and cruel... Read more

Critical Essay by Celeste Turner Wright

2,011 words, approx. 7 pages

In the following essay, Wright calls upon to Mansfield's letters and journals to strengthen her assertion that the fly is a symbol for the author herself while the boss represents her father. O... Read more

Critical Essay by Thomas J. Assad

828 words, approx. 3 pages

In the following essay, Assad argues that the central meaning of “The Fly” is clearly expressed in the line from the story that reads,“we cling to our last pleasures as the tree c... Read more

Critical Essay by Stanley B. Greenfield

851 words, approx. 3 pages

In the following essay, Greenfield observes that the death of the fly represents the end of the boss's grief, the thing that had made him distinct from other men and nations who have moved beyo... Read more

Critical Essay by Pauline P. Bell

1,100 words, approx. 4 pages

In the following essay, Bell argues that Mansfield's “The Fly” is a story about the inevitability of death and humans' retreat from that realization. It seems to me that th... Read more

Critical Essay by Clinton W. Oleson and J. D. Thomas

1,057 words, approx. 4 pages

In the following two-part essay, Oleson takes issue with Thomas's interpretations of the symbolism in “The Fly”; Thomas replies to Oleson's criticism and offers direction f... Read more

Critical Essay by F. W. Bateson and B. Shahevitch

2,762 words, approx. 10 pages

In the following essay, Bateson and Shahevitch discuss how Mansfield makes extraordinary use of literary realism to create a tale that ends in the reader's moral condemnation of the protagonist... Read more

The Fly (short story) SummaryKatherine Mansfield

Study The Fly (short story)

Katherine Mansfield Biography (2)

Essays & Analysis (21)

The Fly (short story) Summary
Katherine Mansfield