It is evident that Katherine Mansfield adopts illusion or dream to react against reality in “Prelude”, which may easily lead to psychological reading. This essay intends to argue the relationship between the covert progression and the overt plot, because the overt plot points to psychiatric reading, while the covert directs to patriarchal censorship. Therefore, their relationship is subversive. On the other hand, female characters are constrained by the patriarchal censorship, and these downtrodden women refer to both the female characters and the author as the cultural context and the author’s biography occupy a significant position in exploring the covert progression in “Prelude” so much so that the writing is also constrained by the phallocentric norm.

Yanfang Lai. Patriarchal Censorship under the Psychiatric Reading in 'Prelude'. Academic Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences (2022) Vol. 5, Issue 5: 58-64. https://doi.org/10.25236/AJHSS.2022.050510.

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