Rossetti Context

Question 1

What was the literacy status of women in Victorian times?

Answer 1

Many women could still not read, so worked in the home as either servants, mothers or housewives.

Question 2

When were women over 30 able to vote?

Answer 2

1918

Question 3

What do the bible and Rossetti have in common?

Answer 3

They both contradict each other.

Rossetti: NTYJ vs. Augusta Webster rejection

Bible: ‘Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord’. Vs Eve

A symbol of Rossetti’s religious mania and coordination with God.

Question 4

Why did contemporary society view Rossetti as a threat?

Answer 4

Societal gender roles at the time. If a woman did not fit the prescribed pattern of a girl-like, innocent angel- she was often viewed a dangerous threat.

Additionally, it was looked down upon for women to write about death, was viewed as a topic out of their reach.

Question 5

Rossetti’s voluntary work

Answer 5

In 1860, she volunteered for the ‘fallen women’ at the St. Mary Magdalene House.

Question 6

In what way was Rossetti’s assistance in redeeming these ‘fallen women’ justified (In a Religious Sense)

Answer 6

According to Christian principles of forgiveness, these women deserve the chance to be redeemed as Jesus emphasised this importance.

Question 7

Define ‘Soul Sleep’

Answer 7

The body dies, the soul remains in a state of unconsciousness.

Waiting for Jesus to be resurrected

Death is one step closer to God, religious mania

‘Silent land’, ‘twilight’ (WIADMD)

Question 8

Define Romanticism

Answer 8

Ability to express emotion

Promotion of emphasis on inspiration

Artistic, literacy, musical and intellectual movement

Originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century

Stressed strong emotion as a source of the aesthetic experience

Question 9

Who were the Pre-Raphelites?

Answer 9

Collection of Victorian poets, artists, painters, illustrators and designers with similar beliefs about art.

Rossetti and her brother (Dante) involved

Question 10

When was the Pre-Raphelites founded?

Answer 10

1848

Question 11

Name a founder of the Pre-Raphelites

Answer 11

Dante Gabriel Rossetti (Rossetti’s brother)

Question 12

What was Rossetti’s relationship with the Pre-Raphelites?

Answer 12

She was never a formal member. Dante often referred to her as a ‘double sisterhood’.

She published poems on behalf of the group

More of an observer rather than a participant

Question 13

Rossetti’s marriage status

Answer 13

Never married.

Rejected multiple marriages for religious reasons for religious reasons: a poet for him being agnostic

Question 14

How is her religious mania shown in the pattern of her poetry?

Answer 14

Each poem in general contradicts eachother which suggests her religious mania and contrasting views on religion and life (females).

Question 15

What was the ‘Goblin Market’ originally?

Answer 15

For the first hundred years after it was written, “Goblin Market” was read almost exclusively as a children’s poem about the importance of sisterhood and sisterly heroism.

Question 16

The contextual origin to ‘No, Thankyou, John’

Answer 16

Said to be based on John Brett (Pre-Raphelite Painter)

Based on real issue she had with this suitor - wrote in “Letters of Christina Rossetti” by William Michael.

Question 17

What did John Brett do when Rossetti rejected him?

Answer 17

1858: stopped working on a portrait of her (Violet Hunt)

Question 18

What was Rossetti’s sister?

Answer 18

Catholic nun differs from their own religious beliefs

Question 19

How would Rossetti’s sister’s religious choice have affected Rossetti? And how would it have influenced her poetry?

Answer 19

Goes against her own Trachtarian beliefs… losing her sister just like Lizzie was losing hers…

But, still, sisters at the end of the day and it stays that way

Question 20

Where does the phrase ‘Angel in the House’ come from?

Answer 20

Coventry Patmore’s immensely popular poem, in which he holds his angel-wife up as a model for all women. It was published in 1854

ROSSETTI OPPOSES THIS IDEA THROUGH BECOMING A NEW WOMAN HERSELF

Question 21

Rossetti’s early education

Answer 21

Rossetti was educated at home by her mother and father, who had her study religious works, classics, fairy tales and novels.

Question 22

Rossetti’s family struggles

Answer 22

In the 1840s, her family faced severe financial difficulties due to the deterioration of her father’s physical and mental health.

HER MOTHER WAS STRONG AND TOOK CARE OF EVERYONE

Question 23

Rossetti’s complete “marriage” history

Answer 23

In her late teens, Rossetti became engaged to the painter James Collinson, the first of three suitors. The engagement was broken in 1850 when he reverted to Catholicism.
Later she became involved with the linguist Charles Cayley, but declined to marry him, also for religious reasons (he was agnostic).
The third offer came from the painter John Brett, whom she also refused. (‘No Thankyou John’)?

Question 24

When did depression hit Rossetti?

Answer 24

In 1849 she became seriously ill again, suffering from depression

Question 25

How did the amount of Christian worshippers change during Rossetti’s lifetime?

Answer 25

By 1851, 60% of the population attended Christian worship regularly

… and by 1901 this decreased to 30%.

Question 26

Why did Augusta Webster write to Rossetti in the late 1870’s?

Answer 26

To ask for her support in a campaign to give women the right to vote. Rossetti declined.

This means she is contradictory.

She said: “Does it not appear as if the Bible was based upon an understood unalterable distinction between men and women?”