Christina Rossetti: Day 2

"If I could trust mine own self with your fate, / Shall I not rather trust it in God's hands?" (13.1-2)
Monna Innominata

Points of Reflection

1. what purpose does the narrative poem "The Dead City" (1847) serve?

2. in the sonnet sequence "They desire a better country" (c.1867/1868), Christina Rossetti takes the familiar trope of exploration and adventure that we've encountered recently and transforms it into something less material but, to her, far more important. What is the journey described?

3. between what two poles/ideas/emotions is the narrator of Monna Innominata (1881) struggling? What is the central tension in this sonnet sequence?

4. in the introduction to this sequence, Christina Rossetti describes her intention to speak for those many romanced ladies of yore who were so often described by their lovers and friends, but who rarely had an opportunity to speak for themselves. "Had such a lady spoken for herself," she writes, "the portrait left us might have appeared more tender, if less dignified, than any drawn even by a devoted friend." Does Rossetti achieve what she attempts? Is this a more realistic look at romantic longing and loss from a female's perspective than one gets in, say, poems by Shakespeare, the cavalier poets, or Rossetti's own male contemporaries?

5. what posture towards marriage does Christina Rossetti express in her work and her own life decisions?

6. track the changing tone across the fourteen sonnets of Monna Innominata.

"Beata Beatrix" (1864-70)
Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Paul Marchbanks
marchban@email.unc.edu