Commentary
Introduction
This arresting sonnet was not published until many years
after DGR's death (1904). DGR briefly considered printing it in his 1870 volume, but
decided otherwise right after he put it in a proof printing in August 1869. Without
doubt (as WMR suggested in
<xref doc="a.pr5240.f11.rad" from="667">1911</xref>
) DGR removed the poem because he judged
the imagery would be too shocking. But of course the vigor of the sonnet is
exactly a function of the imagery; and the latter works with special effectiveness
in DGR's case because physical, erotic love appears in all of his work as an
essential element in any ideal love relation. Prostitution in DGR thus becomes
the essential sign not merely of debased personal relations, but of an
institutionalized set of social disfunctions.
Although the poet is often characterized as devoid of social ideas or conscience,
he was far from such. On the other hand, his sense of an indurated social corruption
(in England and Europe generally) was so intense that it crippled any impulses he might
have had to work against such conditions. In this respect his difference from his
friend Morris is profound.
The antithetical similarities between this sonnet and DGR's celebrated
<xref doc="a.5-1869.raw">“Nuptial Sleep”</xref>
are remarkable.
Textual History: Composition
Two manuscripts of the poem are extant: DGR's
corrected early holograph, dating from 1859 when he composed the sonnet; and the fair copy made by William Sharp, probably dating from 1881. This copy was made from one of the revise proof copies pulled in 1869 (see below, Printing History).
Textual History: Revision
Reception
The poem had some private circulation at the time, as we see from the number of surviving copies of the (so-called) revise proof (see Printing History below).
Printing History
The poem was set in type (as page 195) in the
Penkill
Proofs
in August 1869
but then removed by DGR from the subsequent proofs for the
1870
<xref doc="a.1-1870.raw">Poems</xref>
(see DGR's letter to WMR of 21 August 1869,
Fredeman,
Correspondence
, 69. 130
). He judged that the key metaphor, of prostitution, would strike some readers as indecorous.
The sonnet was not published again until WMR's edition of 1904 (I. 34), and was collected thereafter.
Lewis's discussion of its spurious publication history is important and interesting
(see Lewis,
<hi rend="i">Trial Book Fallacy</hi>
137-151 and 186
). He argues
that the poem was printed by DGR as one of a series of fly-sheet printings (or “printed slips”) of poems that
DGR considered for his 1870 volume but finally rejected. Copies of this sonnet in such a “printed slip” form, which I have called the “revise proof” state, are known to exist at:
the New York Public Library; Princeton; the
Huntington Library (as part of their copy of Trial Book 2 (Lewis's proof state 6); the library of
Arizona State University, Mosher collection; the British Library;
and the Manx Museum (Isle of Man), the last being a copy DGR gave to Hall Caine.
Lewis also argues that the New York Public Library
corrected proof was part of the galley that survives as the Princeton/Troxell
galley
proof of
“Sister
Helen”
.
Other poems DGR had printed off as fly-sheet or slip printings include
<xref doc="a.4-1850.raw">“Dennis Shand”</xref>
and
<xref doc="a.9-1853.raw">“On the Site of A Mulberry Tree”</xref>
. DGR
gave copies of these privately printed objects to various friends from time to time.
After its 1904 publication, the sonnet was collected in WMR's
one volume 1911 edition.
Historical
The sonnet reflects mordantly on the 1859 expulsion of the Austrians
from Italy by Napoleon III with the help of the Piedmontese army. WMR's comments on the
events are important:“Venetia was left unenfranchised from the Austrian yoke,
and all the rest of Italy had to shift for itself as best it might, while France secured
Savoy and Nice, and garrisoned the Pope in Rome. Rossetti. . .wrote this sonnet to
commemorate his forecast of bad times for Europe generally”
; (
1911
667n
).
Literary
The most obvious literary reference is to Dante's
<xref doc="a.dante002.3.rad" link="dead">
<hi rend="i">Purgatorio</hi>
</xref>
XXXII. 148-160,
where Dante denounces the corrupt Papacy and her supporter, the French royal house. DGR
often uses the imagery of prostitution to characterize
degenerate social and/or political circumstances: see e.g.
<xref doc="a.1-1848.s55.raw">“Dante at Verona”</xref>
,
<xref doc="a.30-1871.raw">“After the German Subjugation of France,
1871”</xref>
, and
<xref doc="a.3-1848.raw">“Jenny”</xref>
.
Bibliographic
Bentley,
<xref doc="a.pr461.v53.rad" link="dead" workcode="1-1859" from="176">“Political
Themes”</xref>
, (1979), 176
Gregory,
<hi rend="i">Life and Works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti</hi>
II. 158
Lewis,
<hi rend="i">Thomas James Wise and the Trial Book Fallacy.</hi>
, 137-151
WMR, 1911
667-668n