Christina Rossetti

Christina Georgina Rossetti (December 5, 1830 – December 29, 1894) was an English poet and the sister of artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti as well as William Michael Rossetti and Maria Francesca Rossetti. Their father, Gabriele Rossetti, was an Italian poet and a political asylum seeker from Naples, and their mother, Frances Polidori, was the sister of Lord Byron's friend and physician, John William Polidori.

Rossetti was born in London and educated at home by her mother. In the 1840's her family was stricken with severe financial difficulties due to the deterioriation of her father's physical and mental health, and when she was 14, Rossetti herself suffered a nervous breakdown, which in succeeding years was followed by periodic bouts of depression and related illness. It was during this period of Rossetti's life that she, along with her mother and sister, became seriously invested in the Anglo-Catholic movement that was part of the Church of England, and this religious devotion played a major role in Rossetti's personal life for the rest of her life. In her late teens she was engaged to the painter James Collinson but this courtship eventually ended because of religious difference (Callison reverted back to Catholicism). Later she became involved with the linguist Charles Cayley but ultimately did not marry him either because of religious reasons.

Although Rossetti began writing at an early age, her poetry didn't gain notice until Goblin Market and Other Poems was published in 1862. The collection garnered much critical praise, and according to Jan Marsh, "Elizabeth Barrett Browning's death two months later led to Rossetti being hailed as her natural successor as 'female laureate'." The title poem from this book is Rossetti's best known work. Although upon first glance it may seem a nursery rhyme about two sisters' misadventures with goblins, the poem is multi-layered, challenging, and complex, and critics have interpreted the piece in a variety of ways, seeing it as an allegory about temptation and salvation, a commentary on Victorian gender roles and female agency, an imagining of social redemption. Some readers noted its likeness to Coleridge's "Ancient Mariner" given both poems' religious themes of temptation and sin, and of redemption by vicarious suffering.

During the remainder of her life, Rossetti continued to write and publish, although she focused primarily on devotional writing and children's poetry. Although contemporary readers may think Rossetti as a reclusive prude, this isn't quite accurate. While religion did strictly govern her life, she still maintained a large circle of friends, and for 10 years volunteered at a home for prostitutes. Although she was ambivalent about women's suffrage, many scholars have written on the feminist themes in her poetry. Furthermore, as Marsh notes, "she was opposed to war, slavery (in the American South), cruelty to animals (in the prevalent practice of vivisection), the exploitation of girls in under-age prostitution and all forms of military aggression."

Rossetti's reputation continued to grow during the remainder of her life. In 1893 she contracted cancer and died the following year, in 1894, on December 29. In the early 20th century Rossetti's popularity faded, as many respected Victorian writers' reputations suffered from Modernism's backlash. Rossetti remained largely unnoticed and unread until the 1970's when feminist scholars began to recover and write on her work. In the last few decades, Rossetti's writing has been rediscovered, and she has regained admittance into the Victorian literary canon.