Katherine Mansfield: Doing

Journal entry (19 December 1920), published in The Journal of Katherine Mansfield (1927) edited by J. Middleton Murry

Entry in her journal (10 October 1922) which she tore out to send to John Middleton Murry, before changing her mind. This later became the last published entry in The Journal of Katherine Mansfield (1927) ed. J. Middleton Murry
Context: By health I mean the power to live a full, adult, living, breathing life in close contact with what I love — the earth and the wonders thereof — the sea — the sun. All that we mean when we speak of the external world. A want to enter into it, to be part of it, to live in it, to learn from it, to lose all that is superficial and acquired in me and to become a conscious direct human being. I want, by understanding myself, to understand others. I want to be all that I am capable of becoming so that I may be (and here I have stopped and waited and waited and it’s no good — there’s only one phrase that will do) a child of the sun. About helping others, about carrying a light and so on, it seems false to say a single word. Let it be at that. A child of the sun.

Letter to Anne Estelle Rice (21 May 1921)), from The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield, vol. IV
Context: It's an infernal nuisance to love Life as I do. I seem to love it more as time goes on rather than less. It never becomes a habit to me. It's always a marvel. I do hope I'll be able to keep in it long enough to do some really good work. I'm sick of people dying who promise well.

Source: The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield: Volume 1: 1903-1917

Letter to Bertrand Russell (7 December 1916), from The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield, vol. I