Katherine Mansfield (14 October 1888—9 January 1923) was a prominent modernist writer of short fiction who was born and brought up in colonial New Zealand. Her stories often focus on moments of disruption and frequently open rather abruptly. Among her most well-known stories are The Garden Party, Bliss and The Fly. All her works have depicted the existing state of women. She has paved the way for the solution of the social problem of female emancipation in a uniquely literary manner.

Virginia Woolf once described Katherine Mansfield as "of the cat kind, alien, composed, always solitary and observant."