Question

Rossetti : Goblin Market

Feminist Criticism & Gender Studies

• How are the sexes depicted in the text?

Ethnic Literary Studies

• How does race appear in the text and how does it shape the way we interact with one another?

Answer 1

1). How are the sexes depicted in the text?

Answer-

Rossetti’s poem depicts two “sisters”1 who share a bond stronger than the bond between a man and a woman claiming, “For there is no friend like a sister/ In calm or stormy weather” With the two girls, Lizzie and Laura, Rossetti acknowledges the two extreme perceptions of women as passionless angels and whores.

There are no significant female heroes in English literature up to the time of Rossetti. Female protagonists exist, of course, like Elizabeth in Austen's Pride and Prejudice, but they have no outlet for heroic action. They are constrained by the gender-roles into which a male-dominated society has placed them. Elizabeth must spend a good deal of her energy waiting for Darcy to take action; she herself is hobbled by the cords of decorum.

In "Goblin Market," Rossetti creates a rudimentary framework of behavior in which a female hero — a heroine — might operate. Rossetti's efforts are to some degree successful, though she fails to solve the problem completely.

Throughout the poem Lizzie remains pure; this is nothing new. The role of the unstained virgin has existed longer than the English language. Spenser's Florimell provides an early example. What is different about Lizzie is that she actively pursues temptation with the intention of conquering it. When she sees that Laura is wasting away (Norton 1514), Lizzie resolves to go and get her the fruit as a final, desperate effort to save her sister's life. When the Goblins refuse to sell her the fruit (Norton 1516) and attack Lizzie, she forbears temptation and keeps her mouth closed:

Lizzie uttered not a word;
Would not open lip from lip
Lest they should cram a mouthful in. (Norton 1517)

Eventually, she manages to save her sister by running home and asking Laura to "Hug me, kiss me, suck my juices / Squeezed from goblin fruits for you," explaining that "For your sake, I have braved the glen / And had to do with goblin merchant men" (Norton 1518). Laura's cure, implemented by her sucking the juices from Lizzie's face, is somewhat baffling; the reader is left confused as to what actually cured her, the residual juices or her sister's love.

So what we are left with is this: a woman performed a heroic, self-sacrificing action (certainly related to Christ's sacrifice of himself) to save her sister. Good. However, it seems apparent that there are problems with the framework for feminine heroism constructed by Rossetti. It remains a passive kind of heroism. Lizzie does not attack the goblin men, demanding the antidote for their fruit, or weave a spell of benign magic over her sister. She is forced to offer herself up to goblin abuse (physical, sexual goblin abuse) to perform a positive action. It is possible to account for the passive nature of Lizzie's act by putting it into the context of Rossetti's Christian beliefs (Norton 1501), but that does not seem enough. The ambiguities at the end of "Goblin Market" and the almost out of place, strangely irrelevant feel of the last few lines (caused by their sanitized, formulaic tone at the end of a poem so rich in erotic and violent detail) indicate that Rossetti herself had not reached a satisfactory conclusion on the subject of female heroism.

2). How does race appear in the text and how does it shape the way we interact with one another?​​​​​​​

Answer:

This Feminist Theory will supplement my historically contextual analysis by helping me measure the influence of patriarchal culture and gender binaries in Rossetti’s poetry. Studying feminist theories about culture and literature will allow me to more clearly understand the feminist themes in Rossetti’s poetry and understand how her portrayals of female sexuality may relate to larger social dialogues. Finally, Cultural Criticism is a largely intertextual study that focuses on multiple texts and discourses in order to understand the interactions between various theories and shape the way we interact with one another.