The Letters of Christina Rossetti: 1843-1873

by Christina Rossetti, Antony H. Harrison (Editor)

Overview

Christina Rossetti (1830–1894) has come to be considered one of the major poets—not just one of the major women poets—of the Victorian era, eclipsing her famous brother. Leading critics have demonstrated how studies of Rossetti’s work, her daily life, her relationships with the Pre-Raphaelites, and her interactions with other women authors of the period can help us understand the unique cultural situation of Victorian women writers. The Letters of Christina Rossetti, four volumes, makes available all of Rossetti’s extant letters, almost two-thirds of which have never before been published. These letters come from over one hundred private and institutional collections, scattered from Scotland to Australia.

The fourth and final volume of the Letters covers the last eight years of Christina Rossetti’s life. In 1887 Rossetti, at the age of fifty-six, was living with her two aged, ailing aunts. In addition to managing the household and nursing her aunts, she published an enlarged edition of her collected poems and, in 1892, wrote her greatest book of devotional prose, The Face of the Deep. She also oversaw the production of a new and enlarged edition of Sing-Song, published in 1893.

As a stay-at-home semi-invalid, she maintained a very large correspondence with friends and family members. Her most intimate relationship was with her sole remaining sibling, William Michael Rossetti, but other correspondents include Amelia Barnard Heimann, Caroline Gemmer, Frederic Shields, Rose Donne Hake, Olivia Garnett, Ellen Proctor, Lisa Wilson, Arthur Symons, and Mackenzie Bell, who became her first biographer. In these letters we discover Rossetti’s views on subjects as diverse as the artistry of her poems, her health, aging, death, gender roles, money, cats, flowers, games, and her own supposed sinfulness.

In May of 1892 Christina Rossetti was diagnosed with breast cancer—her most serious medical crisis since her nearly fatal attack of Graves’ disease in the early 1870s. The cancer was removed, but she suffered a recurrence in September 1894 and died on December 29th of that year.

University of Virginia Press

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813922959
Publisher:	University of Virginia Press
Publication date:	12/30/2004
Series:	Victorian Literature and Culture Series , #4
Pages:	464
Product dimensions:	6.40(w) x 9.50(h) x 1.60(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Antony H. Harrison is Professor of English at North Carolina State University. He is the author of Victorian Poets and the Politics of Culture: Discourse and Ideology, Victorian Poets and Romantic Poems: Intertextuality and Ideology; Christina Rossetti in Context; and Swinburne's Medievalism: A Study in Victorian Love Poetry.

What People are Saying About This

"At a time when the poetry of Victorian women is being freshly evaluated, this much-needed, magisterial edition of Christina Rossetti's letters sheds new light on the everyday life of a writer all too often stereotyped as a recluse and still seen by some in the shadow of her brothers.... [Harrison's] sensitive grasp of Rossetti's genius and his complete mastery of all facets of her professional and private life are wonderfully reflected in his introductions and annotations." -- U. C. Knoepflmacher, Princeton University

Editorial Reviews

At a time when the poetry of Victorian women is being freshly evaluated, this much-needed, magisterial edition of Christina Rossetti's letters sheds new light on the everyday life of a writer all too often stereotyped as a recluse and still seen by some in the shadow of her brothers.... [Harrison's] sensitive grasp of Rossetti's genius and his complete mastery of all facets of her professional and private life are wonderfully reflected in his introductions and annotations.

U. C. Knoepflmacher

"With these first two of a projected four volumes, Antony H. Harrison’s The Letters of Christina Rossetti is well on its way to providing another landmark in the reconsideration of Rossetti.... Harrison’s unsurpassed knowledge of Rossetti’s life and keen appreciation of her art make his notes and commentaries nearly as valuable as Rossetti’s own words. The complete collection will be, as these volumes already are, an important resource for readers of Victorian poetry as well as scholars of Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelite movement. "—U. C. Knoepflmacher, Princeton University, author of Victorian Studies

From the Publisher

With these first two of a projected four volumes, Antony H. Harrison’s The Letters of Christina Rossetti is well on its way to providing another landmark in the reconsideration of Rossetti.... Harrison’s unsurpassed knowledge of Rossetti’s life and keen appreciation of her art make his notes and commentaries nearly as valuable as Rossetti’s own words. The complete collection will be, as these volumes already are, an important resource for readers of Victorian poetry as well as scholars of Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelite movement.

— U. C. Knoepflmacher, Princeton University

Victorian Studies

With these first two of a projected four volumes, Antony H. Harrison’s The Letters of Christina Rossetti is well on its way to providing another landmark in the reconsideration of Rossetti.... Harrison’s unsurpassed knowledge of Rossetti’s life and keen appreciation of her art make his notes and commentaries nearly as valuable as Rossetti’s own words. The complete collection will be, as these volumes already are, an important resource for readers of Victorian poetry as well as scholars of Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelite movement.

Victorian Studies - U. C. Knoepflmacher

Edited by Harrison (Victorian Poets and Romantic Poems, Univ. Pr. of Virginia, 1990), Christina Rossetti's (1830-1894) letters in this volume provide insights into her literary and daily life, revealing a girl intent on becoming a poet. First published at 17, she went on to publish several more volumes of poetry and fictional works. The letters show a woman both typical and contradictory of her time: acquiescent and restrained but also somewhat apostolic in her opposition to secularism and a hedonistic world. She wrote mainly to family and friends, with other letters going to editors and publishers. This collection complements several scholarly efforts, including four biographies, that have appeared in the last two decades, but read her poetry for the soul of the woman, which is missing here. For literature collections.Robert Kelly, Fort Wayne Community Schs., Ind.

Library Journal

Rossetti (1830-1894) has begun to be recognized as one of the major poets<-->not just one of the major women poets<-->of the Victorian era, making publication of her letters an important effort. When complete, the set will comprise four volumes of her extant letters, almost two-thirds of which have never been published. The first volume holds 536 letters written during a period of 30 years, most of them to her brothers whose confederation of artists, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, radically expanded her social sphere. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

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