Mansfield Musings
From Page to Stage
Now the Edinburgh Fringe production of her re-imagined Two Tigers is over, writer Sue Casson reflects on the performances. If expressing...
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Sue Casson
MANSFIELD MUSINGS
I first began to write what became the musical drama Two Tigers when I was a fledgling writer of musicals in the mid-1980s. Thirty years on I've been returning to those songs to
re-imagine the show in time for an all new staging for the centenary of Katherine Mansfield's death this year.
In this series of blogs I look at different aspects of her life and writing, what they mean to me and how they touch on my own preoccupations as I piece together
a new version of Two Tigers. Join me as I muse on Mansfield.
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Mansfield Musings
- Oct 18
From Page to Stage
Now the Edinburgh Fringe production of her re-imagined Two Tigers is over, writer Sue Casson reflects on the performances. If expressing...
Mansfield Musings
- Jun 6
A Modernist Musical
Two Tigers is billed as a kaleidoscopic modernist musical of a literary pioneer. Composer Sue Casson explains the inspiration behind the...
Mansfield Musings
- May 23
Imagining Spring 1915
Sue Casson takes a closer look at two houses in St Johns Wood London, with which Katherine Mansfield had a very personal connection....
Mansfield Musings
- May 10
KM and LM
Katherine Mansfield's great friend and supporter Ida Baker, is routinely undermined in many of her biographies. Sue Casson recounts why...
Mansfield Musings
- Apr 18
A Picture paints a Thousand Words…
As preparations to stage Two Tigers in Edinburgh this August get underway, Sue Casson writes the first of an occasional series, about the...
Mansfield Musings
- Apr 6
I can't get him out of my mind...
Katherine Mansfield's brief affair with bohemian French writer Francis Carco during the early months of the First World War marked a gear...
Mansfield Musings
- Mar 22
Do you remember?
Biographers have noted the significance to her writing of a family game Katherine Mansfield played with her brother before his sudden...
Mansfield Musings
- Mar 3
Tea with the Sisters
What could be learnt from having a conversation with people who intimately knew Katherine Mansfield? Sue Casson listens to an...
Mansfield Musings
- Feb 9
A Heron Home
The idea of a proper home for them to share was one which proved complicated for the two tigers. Sue Casson investigates. When does a...
Mansfield Musings
- Jan 20
A Pilgrimage to Portland Villas
The centenary of Katherine Mansfield's death fell on the 9th January this year. To mark it Sue Casson visited the house she shared with...
Mansfield Musings
- Dec 20, 2022
A Romantic Lead?
John Middleton Murry is a controversial figure for many biographers of Katherine Mansfield. Is it possible for him to be dramatically...
Mansfield Musings
- Dec 5, 2022
Behind the Mask
The New Zealand writer was so adept at immersing herself in different roles Sue Casson asks which was the real Katherine Mansfield? John...
Mansfield Musings
- Nov 22, 2022
A Matter of Identity
Modernist writer Katherine Mansfield was a chameleon. Under the guise of name or costume she managed to experiment with living 'all sorts...
Mansfield Musings
- Nov 8, 2022
Keeping up Appearances
Katherine Mansfield always flourished in the spotlight. Recreating her personality for the stage, Sue Casson sees why she is the perfect...
Mansfield Musings
- Oct 26, 2022
Lawrence & Mansfield
Sue Casson explores the natural connection between two very different Modernist literary tigers. If the prose of DH Lawrence and...
Mansfield Musings
- Oct 13, 2022
The Lawrences & The Murrys
Novelist DH Lawrence and his wife Frieda were amongst Mansfield and Murry's closest friends for a time and played a significant role in...
Mansfield Musings
- Sep 27, 2022
Garsington Guests
The two tigers may have moved out of Bloomsbury after a few months, but their association with the Blooms Berries and their extraordinary...
Mansfield Musings
- Sep 15, 2022
The Blooms Berries
For a short time in the Autumn of 1916, the two tigers lived at the centre of Bloomsbury. The people they met there had a lasting...
Mansfield Musings
- Aug 30, 2022
Something Childish but very Natural
Contemporaries and biographers alike have commented on the childlike relationship between the Two Tigers. Sue Casson takes a closer look....
Mansfield Musings
- Aug 18, 2022
Two Tigers - the first time around
Sue Casson remembers her first experiences performing at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. I’m in Edinburgh at the moment, during the...
Mansfield Musings
- Jul 19, 2022
Katherine - The Star Guest
This week The Katherine Mansfield Society gathered for the first time since the pandemic in Bavaria. Sue Casson imagines what KM would...
Mansfield Musings
- Jul 6, 2022
Life after Death
How do you create a lively musical centred on a leading character who dies early? Sue Casson tackles the 'elephant in the room' in Two...
Mansfield Musings
- Jun 20, 2022
Communing with Mansfield
A folder of notes about Katherine Mansfield from the beginnings of her research, takes Two Tigers writer Sue Casson back to another time....
Mansfield Musings
- Jun 6, 2022
Shaking Free
The early Twentieth Century, an exciting time of change for all branches of creative arts, forms the backdrop to Two Tigers. Sue Casson...
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