THE COLLECTED WORKS
OF
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI
Printed by Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and
Aylesbury.
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI
DIED 9 APRIL 1882 AGED 53
FRANCES MARY LAVINIA ROSSETTI
DIED 8 APRIL 1886 AGED 85
TO
THE MOTHER'S SACRED MEMORY
THIS FIRST COLLECTED EDITION OF
THE SON'S WORKS
IS DEDICATED BY
THE SURVIVING SON AND BROTHER
W M R
The most adequate mode of prefacing the Collected
Works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, as of most
authors, would probably be
to offer a broad general
view of his writings, and to analyse with some
critical
precision his relation to other writers, contemporary or
otherwise, and the merits and defects of his performances.
In this
case, as in how few others, one would also have
to consider in what
degree his mind worked con-
sentaneously or diversely in two several
arts—the art of
poetry and the art of painting. But the hand
of a
brother is not the fittest to undertake any work of this
scope. My preface will not therefore deal with themes
such as these,
but will be confined to minor matters,
which may nevertheless be
relevant also within their
limits. And first may come a very brief
outline of the
few events of an outwardly uneventful life.
Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti, who, at an early stage
of his
professional career, modified his name into Dante
Gabriel Rossetti, was
born on 12th May 1828, at No.
38 Charlotte Street, Portland Place,
London. In blood
he was three-fourths Italian, and only one-fourth
Eng-
lish; being on the father's side wholly Italian
(Abruzzese),
and on the mother's side half Italian (Tuscan) and
half
English. His father was Gabriele Rossetti, born in
1783 at
Vasto, in the Abruzzi, Adriatic coast, in the then
kingdom of Naples.
Gabriele Rossetti (died 1854) was
Museo Borbonico of Naples, and a
poet; he distinguished
himself by patriotic lays which fostered the
popular
movement resulting in the grant of a constitution by
Ferdinand I. of Naples in 1820. The King, after the
fashion of Bourbons
and tyrants, revoked the constitution
in 1821, and persecuted the
abettors of it, and Rossetti
had to escape for his freedom, or perhaps
even for his
life. He settled in London towards 1824, married,
and
became Professor of Italian in King's College,
London,
publishing also various works of bold speculation in the
way
of Dantesque commentary and exposition. His
wife was Frances Mary
Lavinia Polidori (died 1886),
daughter of Gaetano Polidori (died 1853),
a teacher of
Italian and literary man who had in early youth
been
secretary to the poet Alfieri, and who published various
books,
including a complete translation of Milton's
poems. Frances Polidori was
English on the side of
her mother, whose maiden name was Pierce.
The
family of Rossetti and his wife consisted of four
children, born
in four successive years—Maria Fran-
cesca (died 1876), Dante
Gabriel, William Michael, and
Christina Georgina, the two last-named
being now the only
survivors. Few more affectionate husbands and
fathers
have lived, and no better wife and mother, than Gabriele
and
Frances Rossetti. The means of the family were
always strictly moderate,
and became scanty towards
1843, when the father's health began to fail.
In or about
that year Dante Gabriel left King's College School,
where
he had learned Latin, French, and a beginning of Greek;
and he
entered upon the study of the art of painting, to
which he had from
earliest childhood exhibited a very
marked bent. After a while he was
admitted to the
yond its antique section. In 1848
Rossetti co-operated
with two of his fellow-students in painting, John
Everett
Millais and William Holman Hunt, and with the
sculptor
Thomas Woolner, in forming the so-called
Præraphaelite
Brotherhood. There were three other members of
the
Brotherhood—James Collinson (succeeded after two
or
three years by Walter Howell Deverell), Frederic
George Stephens,
and the present writer. Ford Madox
Brown, the historical painter, was
known to Rossetti
much about the same time when the
Præraphaelite
scheme was started, and bore an important part
both in
directing his studies and in upholding the movement,
but he
did not think fit to join the Brotherhood in any
direct or complete
sense. Through Deverell, Rossetti
came to know Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal,
daughter of a
Sheffield cutler, herself a milliner's assistant, gifted
with
some artistic and some poetic faculty; in the Spring of
1860,
after a long engagement, they married. Their
wedded life was of short
duration, as she died in
February 1862, having meanwhile given birth to
a still-
born child. For several years up to this date
Rossetti,
designing and painting many works, in oil-colour or as
yet
more frequently in water-colour, had resided at
No. 14 Chatham Place,
Blackfriars Bridge, a line of
street now demolished. In the autumn of
1862 he re-
moved to No. 16 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea. At first
certain
apartments in the house were occupied by Mr.
George Meredith the
novelist, Mr. Swinburne the poet,
and myself. This arrangement did not
last long,
although I myself remained a partial inmate of the
house
up to 1873. My brother continued domiciled in Cheyne
Walk
until his death; but from about 1869 he wasb
frequently away at Kelmscot manorhouse, in Oxford-
shire, not far
from Lechlade, occupied jointly by himself,
and by the poet Mr. William
Morris with his family.
From the autumn of 1872 till the summer of 1874
he
was wholly settled at Kelmscot, scarcely visiting London
at all.
He then returned to London, and Kelmscot
passed out of his ken.
In the early months of 1850 the members of
the
Præraphaelite Brotherhood, with the co-operation
of
some friends, brought out a short-lived magazine named
<xref doc="a.ap4.g415.raw">The Germ</xref>
(afterwards Art and Poetry); here appeared
the
first verses and the first prose published by Rossetti,
including
and
.
In 1856 he contributed a little to
<xref doc="a.ap4.o93.raw">The Oxford and<lb/>Cambridge
Magazine</xref>
, printing there
. In 1861, during his married life, he published
his volume of
translations
, now
entitled
. By the time therefore of
the death of his wife he had a certain
restricted yet far
from inconsiderable reputation as a poet, along with
his
recognized position as a painter—a non-exhibiting
painter,
it may here be observed, for, after the first two
or three
years of his professional course, he ad-
hered with practical uniformity
to the plan of abstaining
from exhibition altogether. He had
contemplated bring-
ing out in or about 1862 a volume of original
poems;
but, in the grief and dismay which overwhelmed
him in losing
his wife, he determined to sacri-
fice to her memory this long-cherished
project, and he
buried in her coffin the manuscripts which would
have
furnished forth the volume. With the lapse of years he
came to
see that, as a final settlement of the matter,
this was neither
obligatory nor desirable; so in 1869 the
manuscripts were disinterred, and in 1870 his volume
named
<xref doc="a.1-1870.raw">Poems</xref>
was issued. For some considerable
while it was hailed with general
and lofty praise,
chequered by only moderate stricture or demur;
but
late in 1871 Mr. Robert Buchanan published under a
pseudonym, in
the
<xref doc="a.ap4.c7.raw">Contemporary Review</xref>
, a very hostile
article named
<xref doc="a.ap4.c7.18.rad" workcode="buchanan003">The Fleshly
School of Poetry</xref>
, attacking
the poems on literary and more especially on
moral
grounds. The article, in an enlarged form, was after-
wards
reissued as a pamphlet. The assault produced
on Rossetti an effect
altogether disproportionate to its
intrinsic importance; indeed, it
developed in his cha-
racter an excess of sensitiveness and of
distempered
brooding which his nearest relatives and friends
had
never before surmised,—for hitherto he had on the
whole
had an ample sufficiency of high spirits, combined with
a
certain underlying gloominess or abrupt moodiness of
nature and outlook.
Unfortunately there was in him
already only too much of morbid material
on which this
venom of detraction was to work. For some years
the
state of his eyesight had given very grave cause for
appre-
hension, he himself fancying from time to time that the
evil
might end in absolute blindness, a fate with which
our father had been
formidably threatened in his closing
years. From this or other causes
insomnia had ensued,
coped with by far too free a use of chloral, which
may
have begun towards the end of 1869. In the summer of
1872 he had
a dangerous crisis of illness; and from that
time forward, but more
especially from the middle of
1874, he became secluded in his habits of
life, and often
depressed, fanciful, and gloomy. Not indeed that
there
were no intervals of serenity, even of brightness; for in
fact
he was often genial and pleasant, and a most agreeable
companion, with as much bonhomie
an evening away. He continued also to
prosecute his
pictorial work with ardour and diligence, and at times
he
added to his product as a poet. The second of his
original
volumes,
<xref doc="a.2-1881.raw">Ballads and Sonnets</xref>
, was published in the
autumn of 1881. About the same time he
sought change
of air and scene in the Vale of St. John, near
Keswick,
Cumberland; but he returned to town more shattered
in
health and in mental tone than he had ever been before.
In
December a shock of a quasi-paralytic character struck
him down. He
rallied sufficiently to remove to Birching-
ton-on-Sea, near Margate.
The hand of death was then
upon him, and was to be relaxed no more. The
last
stage of his maladies was uræmia. Tended by
his
mother and his sister Christina, with the constant
com-
panionship at Birchington of Mr. Hall Caine, and in
the
presence likewise of Mr. Theodore Watts, Mr. Frederick
Shields,
and myself, he died on Easter Sunday, April 9th
1882. His sister-in-law,
the daughter of Madox Brown,
arrived immediately after his latest breath
had been
drawn. He lies buried in the churchyard of Birchington.
Few brothers were more constantly together, or shared
one another's
feelings and thoughts more intimately, in
childhood, boyhood, and well
on into mature manhood,
than Dante Gabriel and myself. I have no idea
of
limning his character here at any length, but will de-
fine a few
of its leading traits. He was always and
essentially of a dominant turn,
in intellect and in
temperament a leader. He was impetuous and
vehe-
ment, and necessarily therefore impatient; easily
angered,
easily appeased, although the embittered
feelings of his later years
obscured this amiable quality
to some extent; constant and helpful as a
friend where
he perceived constancy to be reciprocated; free-handed
and heedless
of expenditure, whether for himself or for
others; in family affection
warm and equable, and (except
in relation to our mother, for whom he had
a fondling
love) not demonstrative. Never on stilts in matters
of
the intellect or of aspiration, but steeped in the sense
of
beauty, and loving, if not always practising, the good;
keenly alive
also (though many people seem to discredit
this now) to the laughable as
well as the grave or solemn
side of things; superstitious in grain, and
anti-scientific
to the marrow. Throughout his youth and early
man-
hood I considered him to be markedly free from vanity,
though
certainly well equipped in pride; the distinction
between these two
tendencies was less definite in his
closing years. Extremely natural and
therefore totally
unaffected in tone and manner, with the
naturalism
characteristic of Italian blood; good-natured and
hearty,
without being complaisant or accommodating; reserved
at
times, yet not haughty; desultory enough in youth,
diligent and
persistent in maturity; self-centred always,
and brushing aside whatever
traversed his purpose or
his bent. He was very generally and very
greatly liked
by persons of extremely diverse character; indeed,
I
think it can be no exaggeration to say that no one ever
disliked
him. Of course I do not here confound the
question of liking a man's
personality with that of
approving his conduct out-and-out.
Of his manner I can perhaps convey but a vague
impression. I have
said that it was natural; it was
likewise eminently easy, and even of
the free-and-easy
kind. There was a certain British bluffness,
streaking
the finely poised Italian suppleness and facility. As
he
was thoroughly unconventional, caring not at all to
fall in with the humours or prepossessions of any
particular class
of society, or to conciliate or approxi-
mate the socially
distinguished, there was little in him
of any veneer or varnish of
elegance; none the less he
was courteous and well-bred, meeting all
sorts of persons
upon equal terms—i.e.,
upon his own terms; and I am
satisfied that those who are most exacting
in such
matters found in Rossetti nothing to derogate from
the
standard of their requirements. In habit of body he was
indolent
and lounging, disinclined to any prescribed
or trying exertion of any
sort, and very difficult to stir
out of his ordinary groove, yet not
wanting in active
promptitude whenever it suited his liking. He
often
seemed totally unoccupied, especially of an evening;
no doubt
the brain was busy enough.
The appearance of my brother was to my eye rather
Italian than
English, though I have more than once
heard it said that there was
nothing observable to
bespeak foreign blood. He was of rather low
middle
stature, say five feet seven and a half, like our
father;
and, as the years advanced, he resembled our father
not a
little in a characteristic way, yet with highly
obvious divergences.
Meagre in youth, he was at
times decidedly fat in mature age. The
complexion,
clear and warm, was also dark, but not dusky or
sombre.
The hair was dark and somewhat silky; the brow
grandly
spacious and solid; the full-sized eyes blueish-grey;
the
nose shapely, decided, and rather projecting, with an
aquiline tendency
and large nostrils, and perhaps no
detail in the face was more
noticeable at a first glance
than the very strong indentation at the
spring of the
nose below the forehead; the mouth moderately
well-
shaped, but with a rather thick and unmoulded under-
lip; the chin unremarkable; the line of the jaw, after
youth was
passed, full, rounded, and sweeping; the ears
well-formed and rather
small than large. His hips were
wide, his hands and feet small; the
hands very much
those of the artist or author type, white,
delicate,
plump, and soft as a woman's. His gait was resolute
and
rapid, his general aspect compact and deter-
mined, the prevailing
expression of the face that
of a fiery and dictatorial mind concentrated
into re-
pose. Some people regarded Rossetti as eminently
handsome;
few, I think, would have refused him the
epithet of well-looking. It
rather surprises me to
find from Mr. Caine's book of
that that
gentleman, when he first saw Rossetti in 1880,
con-
sidered him to look full ten years older than he
really
was,—namely, to look as if sixty-two years old. To
my
own eye nothing of the sort was apparent. He wore
moustaches from
early youth, shaving his cheeks; from
1870 or thereabouts he grew
whiskers and beard, mode-
rately full and auburn-tinted, as well as
moustaches. His
voice was deep and harmonious; in the reading of
poetry,
remarkably rich, with rolling swell and musical cadence.
My brother was very little of a traveller; he disliked
the
interruption of his ordinary habits of life, and the
flurry or
discomfort, involved in locomotion. In boy-
hood he knew Boulogne: he
was in Paris three or four
times, and twice visited some principal
cities of Belgium.
This was the whole extent of his foreign
travelling.
He crossed the Scottish border more than once, and
knew
various parts of England pretty well—Hastings,
Bath, Oxford,
Matlock, Stratford-on-Avon, Newcastle-
on-Tyne, Bognor, Herne Bay;
Kelmscot, Keswick, and
Birchington-on-Sea, have been already mentioned. From
1878 or thereabouts he became, until he went to the
neighbourhood
of Keswick, an absolute home-keeping
recluse, never even straying
outside the large garden of
his own house, except to visit from time to
time our
mother in the central part of London.
From an early period of life he had a large circle of
friends, and
could always have commanded any amount
of intercourse with any number of
ardent or kindly
well-wishers, had he but felt elasticity and
cheerfulness
of mind enough for the purpose. I should do
injustice
to my own feelings if I were not to mention here some
of
his leading friends. First and foremost I name Mr.
Madox Brown, his
chief intimate throughout life, on
the unexhausted resources of whose
affection and con-
verse he drew incessantly for long years; they were
at
last separated by the removal of Mr. Brown to Man-
chester, for
the purpose of painting the Town Hall
frescoes. The
Præraphaelites—Millais, Hunt, Woolner,
Stephens,
Collinson, Deverell—were on terms of un-
bounded familiarity
with him in youth; owing to death
or other causes, he lost sight
eventually of all of them
except Mr. Stephens. Mr. William Bell Scott
was, like
Mr. Brown, a close friend from a very early period
until
the last; Scott being both poet and painter, there was
a
strict bond of affinity between him and Rossetti.
Mr. Ruskin was
extremely intimate with my brother
from 1854 till about 1865, and was of
material help to
his professional career. As he rose towards
celebrity,
Rossetti knew Burne Jones, and through him Morris
and
Swinburne, all staunch and fervently sympathetic
friends. Mr. Shields
was a rather later acquaintance,
who soon became an intimate, equally
respected and
cherished. Then Mr. Hueffer the musical critic (now
a close family connection, editor of the Tauchnitz edition
of
Rossetti's works), and Dr. Hake the poet. Through
the latter my brother
came to know Mr. Theodore
Watts, whose intellectual companionship and
incessant
assiduity of friendship did more than anything
else
towards assuaging the discomforts and depression of his
closing
years. In the latest period the most intimate
among new acquaintances
were Mr. William Sharp and
Mr. Hall Caine, both of them known to
Rossettian readers
as his biographers. Nor should I omit to speak of
the
extremely friendly relation in which my brother stood to
some of
the principal purchasers of his pictures—Mr.
Leathart, Mr.
Rae, Mr. Leyland, Mr. Graham, Mr. Valpy,
Mr. Turner, and his early
associate Mr. Boyce. Other
names crowd upon me—James Hannay,
John Tupper,
Patmore, Thomas and John Seddon, Mrs.
Bodichon,
Browning, John Marshall, Tebbs, Mrs. Gilchrist, Miss
Boyd,
Sandys, Whistler, Joseph Knight, Fairfax Murray,
Mr. and Mrs. Stillman,
Treffry Dunn, Lord and Lady
Mount-Temple, Oliver Madox Brown, the
Marstons,
father and son—but I forbear.
Before proceeding to some brief account of the
sequence, etc., of
my brother's writings, it may be worth
while to speak of the poets who
were particularly
influential in nurturing his mind and educing its
own
poetic endowment. The first poet with whom he
became partially
familiar was Shakespeare. Then fol-
lowed the usual boyish fancies for
Walter Scott and
Byron. The Bible was deeply impressive to
him,
perhaps above all Job, Ecclesiastes, and the Apocalypse.
Byron
gave place to Shelley when my brother was about
sixteen years of age;
and Mrs. Browning and the old
English or Scottish ballads rapidly
ensued. It may have
been towards this date, say 1845, that he first seriously
applied
himself to Dante, and drank deep of that in-
exhaustible well-head of
poesy and thought; for the
Florentine, though familiar to him as a name,
and in
some sense as a pervading penetrative influence,
from
earliest childhood, was not really assimilated until boy-
hood
was practically past. Bailey's
<xref doc="a.bailey001.rad" link="dead">Festus</xref>
was enor-
mously relished about the same time—read
again and
yet again; also
, Victor Hugo, De Musset (and
along with them a swarm of French
novelists), and
Keats, whom my brother for the most part, though
not
without some compunctious visitings now and then,
truly
preferred to Shelley. The only classical poet
whom he took to in any
degree worth speaking of was
Homer, the
Tennyson reigned along with Keats, and Edgar Poe
and
Coleridge along with Tennyson. In the long run he
perhaps
enjoyed and revered Coleridge beyond any other
modern poet whatsoever;
but Coleridge was not so
distinctly or separately in the ascendant, at
any par-
ticular period of youth, as several of the others.
Blake
likewise had his peculiar meed of homage, and Charles
Wells,
the influence of whose prose style, in the
The reader may perhaps be surprised to find some
names unmentioned
in this list: I have stated the facts
as I reme