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“Goblin Market” Is A Poem That Celebrates Sisterhood
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Presentation on how Goblin Market is fundamentally a poem that celebrates sisterhood. This is just one of the many interpretations of the poem.
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“Goblin Market” Is A Poem That CelebratesSisterhood
Which Critics Have Argued For This
Interpretation?
Janet Galligani Casey: MAIN ARGUMENTS
1. Argues that the idea of “sisterhood” in Goblin Market is all about the
interdependence between females, and that one sister is not superior over the
other.
2. Two distinct individuals who are equally incomplete. Neither sister is superior
over the other.
[Even though Laura succumbs to the temptation of the fruit, neither Lizzie nor the
narrator offer an explicit negative judgement. Closeness of the girls is emphasised
immediately after the temptation occurs, further stresses the equality of the
girls.]
Additional Notes:
● In Christianity, the male is the Redeemer; Church hierarchy, male suffrage, and
other patriarchal practices carried this religious tradition of male power into the
cultural realm. Females are relegated to the supporting role of Mary/Martha
(fulfilling the secondary function of nurturing the male, the Christ figure) or as
Eve (archetypal “fallen woman”, embodiment of spiritual love and associated with
carnal love). Both these roles are inferior to the roles of men.
● Carnal love: physical, sexual love
● Victorian female = egoless, domestic “angel” in service of the male, who possess
all social and political power.
● Diametrically opposed to this “ideal” of womanhood is the “fallen” woman, whose
sins are of a sexual nature.
● Concept of a “female Christ” was not uncommon among Victorian female writers.
● “Sisterhood” can also be interpreted as a sexual identification as much as a
biological kinship.
, ● Christina Rossetti’s writings demonstrate how she sees a connection between
the “male” and “female” roles that are traditionally mutually exclusive.
● At the end of GM, Rossetti posits not a world without men, but a world in which
all people are allowed to play all parts, to embrace wholeness that is only
possible with the dissolution of the traditional male/female dichotomy.
● Sisterhood = interdependence
● Traditional female role of nurturing = traditional roles of men.
● Rossetti was heavily influenced by Florence Nightingale, whose brave service in
Crimea made her an atypical Victorian female and whose outspoken views on
the role of women, especially in her essay Cassandra, have clear affinities with
GM.
● In GM, Rossetti has created a world in which women embody the “strong”, male
side of life as well as the “weak”, female side.
● Achieved through subverting the Biblical stories of Eve and Christ.
● Undercuts the idea that the redeemer/ spiritual superior (Lizzie) is better or
above the redeemed/ erotic (Laura).
● Goblins do not represent the nature of human males. Both Lizzie and Laura
seem contentedly married at end of the poem: this would be inappropriate if the
goblins were intended to represent all members of the male sex.
● Two girls represent two halves of one personality, which becomes “divided” after
Laura’s “fall” and must reintegrate.
● Two distinct individuals who are equally incomplete. Neither sister is superior
over the other.
● Even though Laura succumbs to the temptation of the fruit, neither Lizzie nor the
narrator offer an explicit negative judgement.
● Closeness of the girls is emphasised immediately after the temptation occurs,
further stresses the equality of the girls.
● The molestation allowed Lizzie to confront and defeat her own fear of sensuality.
Lizzie is the one who then initiates the erotic scene.
● Laura’s lesson = be prudent and that erotic love is empty without emotional
commitment.
● Lizzie’s lesson = bold action is okay and that physical love is both beautiful and
integral to the human experience.
● By substituting “sisterhood” for the term “brotherhood”, Rosetti calls attention to
those language practices that assign masculine terminology to conditions which
do not have a sexual dimension or bias and which rightfully should include
women as well as men (humanity, mankind, etc).
● Wants to show both terms are equally valid.
● Anglican sisterhoods were advocated for by Oxford Movement leaders such as
John Henry Newman.
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