Celebrated short story writer Katherine Mansfield delves deep into the human psyche to understand the nature of human relationship. The only conclusion that the readers are presented with is a no conclusion. This presentation presents to you a detailed summary of the story with its alternating perspectives. Various possibilities of themes are analyzed. Like her other famous story "The Doll's House" this story too is psychological.

1. A DILL PICKLE
By Katherine Mansfield
MS. B. POOVILANGOTHAI
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR,
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
GOVERNMENT ARTS AND SCIENCE COLLEGE,
ARAKKONAM

2. THE STORY IN SHORT: THE MAN’S
VERSION
• Vera and her former lover meet accidentally in a diner 6
years after separation. The man wasn't expecting her and
therefore he couldn't recognize her immediately. Vera joins
him for coffee.
• The man's first observation was that Vera has changed a lot.
Vera teases him by saying that she still hates cold and
therefore hasn’t changed much.
• Vera is happy to see the man and so is the man. In fact both
of them want to get back together.
• The man remembers the happy moments they had together
like in the Kew Gardens when Vera taught him the names of
flowers.
• He remembers her unique voice, "your beautiful way of
speaking" and her singing.
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3. THE STORY IN SHORT: THE MAN’S
VERSION
• At one point the man says, “I wish that I had taken poison
and were about to die — here now!” In a touching soft voice
taking her hand to his cheek he clarifies, “Because I know I
am going to love you too much — far too much. And I shall
suffer so terribly, Vera, because you never, never will love
me.”
• He then talks about his travel to - all the places they had
wanted to travel as a couple - especially Russia. He had not
just visited those places. He had stayed there for longer
periods to ‘air oneself’ in the words of Vera.
• He recounts his experience in Russia where he had stayed
for over a year. The man tells her that Russia was in every
way they both had imagined. Russia was "so informal, so
impulsive, so free without question" and the people have
embraced equality.
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4. THE STORY IN SHORT: THE MAN’S
VERSION
• Once when he was picnicking at the Black Sea with his
friends, the coachman came up to them and offered them his
dill pickle despite being a humble coachman and the tourists
were already eating. The man considers this the most
righteous behaviour.
• He tells Vera that since she was a very good listener, he was
able to open up like never before to her. He even remembers
that he had told her about the time in his childhood when he
ran away and hid under a cart for two days straight.
• Reflecting on his personality then, he says that he might
have been very boring to Vera that she is justified in writing
that breakup letter which spoke at length about his
personality.
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5. THE STORY IN SHORT: THE MAN’S
VERSION
• At this point Vera raises to leave, but the man requests her to stay for a
bit longer.
• He then tells her that 6 years ago, all he had wanted to do was to be a
carpet for her – to live for her happiness. He tells her that she was the
loneliest person he had met so far, and yet she was the only person who
had been truly alive. He goes on to say that she was born out of her time.
• He enquires if she still is lonely and confirms that he too is lonely.
• As if an epiphany hits him, he tells her that their relationship didn’t
materialize because both of them had been egoistical.
• This becomes the last straw for Vera. She simply leaves the restaurant.
• After Vera leaves, the man is seen requesting the waiter not to charge him
for the untouched cream.
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6. • Parallel to the man’s talking, Vera recollects events from her
past that brings out the difference of their perceptions.
• The first thing that Vera notices about the man is his peculiar
way of peeling oranges.
• Secondly he interrupts her to call on the waitress to get Vera
some coffee and cream. Vera remembers the man’s habit of
interrupting her was a great cause of her irritation when they
were dating.
• As the man recollected a pleasant afternoon in the Kew
Gardens, all that Vera could remember is the fuss he had
made about “the wasps – waving them away, flapping at
them with this straw hat, serious and infuriated out of all
proportion to the occasion…and how she had suffered”
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THE STORY IN SHORT: THE COUNTER NARRATION

7. • Despite that memory she is overtaken by the sweetness of his
memory and another sweeter memory of sitting in a lawn
crosses her mind.
• When the man says that he would take poison etc., she sees a
little girl in white dress holding water lily staring at them from
behind a bush.
• When asked why he would take poison, the man says that he
knew that Vera doesn’t love him and he would suffer
immensely because he loved her far too much.
• Vera is quite surprised to learn that the man had really been to
Russia. The man then goes on to talk about his travel to all the
places that Vera and he had wanted to visit – Spain, Corsica,
Siberia, Russia, Egypt.
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THE STORY IN SHORT: THE COUNTER NARRATION

8. • As the man continues to talk about his travel, Vera feels the rise of
a strange beast which had so long been sleeping inside her. But
Vera chooses to be polite to the man.
• In the course of their conversation, the readers learn that Vera had
sold her piano long ago and her life has changed from its intended
course.
• On hearing the story of the Dill Pickle, Vera imagines the same
scene happening to her. In her imagination, she finds the Dill
Pickle too sour. In a brief pause following the story, Vera
recollects the connection they once had. Just then the man
recollects himself opening up to her.
• Vera remembers another incident from that long ago evening – the
man fretting over a little pot of caviare she had bought for seven
and sixpence. He had cried, “No, really, that is eating money. You
could not get seven shillings into a little pot that size.”
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THE STORY IN SHORT: THE COUNTER NARRATION

9. • But Vera remembers the name of the little dog that kept the man
company in his running away story. Contrarily the man does not.
In fact he says, “I had to take a leap over my whole life to get back
to that time.”
• When the man talks about the break up letter she had written to
him 6 years ago, Vera gets ready to leave because she is sure that
he had been mocking her all along. But the man pleads her to stay
and keeps her glove by way of stopping her from leaving.
• Vera finds the strange beast purring inside her when the man tells
her how he had wanted to serve her, to fulfill her every whim. She
even panics that their relationship is over when he tells her how
she was the loneliest, yet the truly alive person.
• Vera finally leaves when the man tells her that it is their ego that
had killed their relationship and begins to talk about a Mind
System he had studied in Russia.
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THE STORY IN SHORT: THE COUNTER NARRATION

10. • The story is narrated by third person omniscient
narrator at the surface. However, the story unfolds
in the stream of consciousness – the memories of
Vera. Her memories capture her feelings of
irritation, trust and warmth, aversion, and
disappointment.
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NARRATION

11. • The male is presented as the rational self – one
associated with material, success, and self-centered.
• He is conscious in spending – would not spend seven
and sixpence for caviare; asking not to charge for the
untouched cream etc.,
• He is successful – travelled to places, smokes expensive
cigarette and dines at fine restaurants
• He is self-centered – remembers only pleasant things
about him – learning the names of flowers, opening up
to Vera etc.,
• Even though he imagines himself to love Vera more, he
overcomes her rejection quite successfully.
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THEMES: RATIONAL SELF VS. EMOTIONAL SELF

12. • Vera is a representative of the emotional self –
remembering unpleasant events, minute details, a heart
for finer and softer things, and having unexplainable
emotions
• Vera remembers the not so pleasant things in their
relationship – he fussing over wasps, upset about
spending so much money on caviare, his peculiar way
of peeling oranges.
• Vera remembers the name of the man’s childhood dog
which he himself had forgotten.
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THEMES: RATIONAL SELF VS. EMOTIONAL SELF

13. • She loves flowers, going to scenic places like Russia,
Siberia, doesn’t care about spending a fortune over a
small pot of caviare, loves music, and sings. She is not
materially successful.
• She is the one who feels a strange beast awakening at
her heart when the man becomes boastful of his success
and once again when he says he wanted to be her carpet.
• It is her complex emotional state that cannot accept the
on the surface talk of the man.
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THEMES: RATIONAL SELF VS. EMOTIONAL SELF

14. • Going by the general understanding of men as
rational and women as emotional, A Dill Pickle
presents the dichotomy between the two
genders.
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THEMES: MAN VS. WOMAN

15. • It presents two opposing psychological states of mind. Vera
is a sensitive woman, more loyal, more truthful, and
expecting the same from others. As a result she is more
secluded and content with her own self. But material crisis in
her life has jeopardized her balance that she asks herself,
“Ah, God! What had she done! How had she dared to throw
away her happiness like this.” The two times when she feels
the beast in her awakening is when the man is being boastful
and untruthful. Her psyche would not accept baser emotions
neither from the man nor from her own self.
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PSYCHOLOGICAL DRAMA

16. • Little girl in white dress symbolizes her innocent
and gullible self.
• The dill pickle symbolizes their sour
relationship.
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SYMBOLS

17. • Katherine Mansfield (1888 1923) is a New Zealand-born
English master of the short story.
• She evolved a distinctive prose style with many overtones
of poetry.
• Her delicate stories, focused upon psychological conflicts,
have an obliqueness of narration and a subtlety of
observation that reveal the influence of Anton Chekhov.
• She, in turn, had much influence on the development of the
short story as a form of literature.
(source: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Katherine-
Mansfield)
Note on the Author