A Match with the Moon Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1 1854
abbaaccadeedff iambic pentameter sonnet
<author/> <city/> <publisher/> <date/> <pages/> </bibl> <note/> </citnliterary> <citntranslationoriginal> <bibl> <title/> <author/> <city/> <publisher/> <date/> <pages/> </bibl> <note/> </citntranslationoriginal> <citnpictorial> <title/> <artist/> <location/> <bibl> <title/> <author/> <city/> <publisher/> <date/> <pages/> </bibl> <note/> </citnpictorial> <citnmythic> <name/> <culture/> <bibl> <title/> <author/> <city/> <publisher/> <date/> <pages/> </bibl> <note/> </citnmythic> <citnhistorical> <event/> <place/> <date/> <bibl> <title/> <author/> <city/> <publisher/> <date/> <pages/> </bibl> <note/> </citnhistorical> <citnautobiographical> <name/> <place/> <date/> <bibl> <title/> <author/> <city/> <publisher/> <date/> <pages/> </bibl> <note/> </citnautobiographical> <citnscenic> <place/> <date/> <bibl> <title/> <author/> <city/> <publisher/> <date/> <pages/> </bibl> <note/> </citnscenic> </listcitn> </source> <commentaries> <head>Commentary</head> <section type="intro"> <head>Introduction</head> <p>It is striking that DGR approaches the close of his volume with a poem that takes such a light and (in his brother's terms) <quote>“playful”</quote> attitude. Nevertheless, DGR's sonnet makes a clear reflexive turn on the volume as a whole, as the poem's central game—the literalization of the <quote>“similes”</quote> (line 3) in four subsequent instances —shows unmistakeably. </p> <p>The moon in the poem represents, of course, the poetic imagination. Her easy relations with her poet, as here represented, literalize the idea of <quote>“sweet companionships”</quote> touched in the preceding sonnet (<title level="wrk"> <xref doc="a.2-1855.sa55.raw">“Beauty and the Bird”</xref> ), and recurred to throughout the volume. DGR's light tone here intimates that the spirit presiding over his work, and its future promise, need not be imagined in fearful terms. Lines 9-10, recalling as they do Coleridge's <xref doc="a.coleridge001.002.rad" link="dead">“Rime of the Ancient Mariner”</xref> (lines 446-451), emphasize the illusory character of the dark “shadow[s]” often evoked in the volume.

The closing lines of the poem recapitulate, in a tone we have not before registered, a familiar motif in the book: the double nature of the poet's beloved (and desire)—Soul's Beauty and Body's Beauty.

Textual History: Composition

According to WMR (1911) the poem was written in 1854. Three manuscripts survive: a corrected fair copy in the Huntington Library (the earliest manuscript); another corrected fair copy in the Fitzwilliam Museum; and a fair copy at Princeton.

Textual History: Revision

The text in the A2 Proofs underwent only one revision before it was published in the 1870 <xref doc="a.1-1870.1stedn.rad" workcode="5-1854"> <title level="wrk">Poems — in line 6, "liquorish" was changed to "vapourish." Thereafter the text did not change. The manuscript in the Princeton-Taylor collection was either printer's copy or the copy from which printer's copy was made.

Production History

Reception

Iconographic

Printing History

First printed in the A2 Proofs in September 1869; DGR hesitated about including it in the 1870 volume. On 14 September 1869 he wrote his brother that “I have now included two old sonnets <xref doc="a.2-1850.raw">‘Autumn Idleness’</xref> and <xref doc="a.5-1854.raw">‘A Match with the Moon’</xref> . The first as now revised I like well. The second I like too, but do you think it lays itself open to ridicule?” (Fredeman, Correspondence , 69.154 ). WMR replied that he found “nothing exceptionable” in the poem's “playful quaintness”, and so DGR kept the poem (Peattie, Letters of William Michael Rossetti , 231 ). DGR reprinted it in his 1881 New Edition and it was collected thereafter.

Pictorial

Historical

Literary

Translation

Autobiographical

The autobiographical elements of the three previous poems in the volume, and especially of <xref doc="a.2-1855.sa55.raw">“Beauty and the Bird”</xref> (immediately preceding), incline one to see a glancing reference to DGR's dead wife in the closing lines of the sonnet.

Bibliographic

1881 Poems First Edition text 1881 Poems First Edition text Poems (1870): Proofs for first edition, British Library copy, (Ashley 1405) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 March 1-7 0 Poems (1870): Proofs for first edition, Fitzwilliam Museum (Copy 1) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 March 1 (and 22 March for additional material) 0 Poems (1870): Proofs for first edition, Princeton/Troxell Copy Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 March 1-7 0 Poems (1870): Mixed Proofs 1869-1870, Fitzwilliam Museum Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 October - 1970 March 0 Poems (1870): First Edition Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 April 26 0 Poems (1870): Second Edition (DGR's corrected copy) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 May 0 Poems (1870): Second Edition Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 May 0 Poems (1870): Third Edition (copy 1) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 June 0 Poems (1870): Third Edition (copy 2) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 June 0 Poems (1870): Fourth Edition Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1870 July (or early August) 0 Poems (1870): Fifth Edition Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1871 0 Poems (1870): Sixth Edition Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1872 0 Poems. (Privately Printed.): A Proof, Lasner Copy Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 September 13 0 Poems. (Privately Printed).: the A2 Proofs, Fitzwilliam Museum Copy Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 September 20 0 Poems. (Privately Printed.): the A2 Proofs (partial), Princeton/Troxell (Copy 2) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 September 20 0 Poems by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1873): the Tauchnitz Edition 1873 November 15 (late November or early December) 0 Poems by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1873): the Tauchnitz Edition, with author's corrections (Yale copy) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1873 November 15 (late November or early December) 0 Poems by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1873): the Tauchnitz Edition, page proofs with author's corrections Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1873 November (early November) 0 Poems. (Privately Printed).: First Trial Book, British Library copy (Ashley 1393) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 October 3 0 Poems. (Privately Printed).: First Trial Book (Fitzwilliam Museum copy) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 October 3 0 Poems. (Privately Printed).: First Trial Book, Princeton/Troxell (Losh copy) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 October 3 0 Poems. (Privately Printed.): Second Trial Book, British Library, (Ashley 1400) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 November 30 (25 November - 6 December) 0 Poems. (Privately Printed).: Second Trial Book (Fitzwilliam Museum copy) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 November 25 0 Poems, Privately Printed: Second Trial Book, Alice Boyd/Lasner copy. Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 November 25 0 Poems. (Privately Printed.): Second Trial Book, Princeton/Troxell. Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 November 25 0 Poems. (Privately Printed.): Second Trial Book (partial), author's working copy, Princeton/Troxell. Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1869 November 25 0 Poems. A New Edition. (1881) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1881 0 Poems. A New Edition (1881), proof Signature T (Delaware Museum, first proof (author's copy)) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1881 May 16 (circa) 0 Poems. A New Edition (1881), proof Signature T (Delaware Museum, first proof (copy 2)) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1881 May 16 (circa) 0 Poems. A New Edition (1881), proof Signature T (Delaware Museum, first revise proof (uncorrected)) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1881 May 18 (circa) 0 Poems. A New Edition (1881), proof Signature T (Delaware Museum, first revise proof (copy 1)) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1881 May 18 (circa) 0 Poems. A New Edition (1881), proof Signature T (Delaware Museum, first revise proof (copy 2)) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1881 May 18 (circa) 0 Poems. A New Edition (1881), proof Signature T (Delaware Museum, final proof) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1881 May 20 (circa) 0 The Collected Works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, vol. 1 (1886) Dante Gabriel Rossetti William Michael Rossetti 1886 0 Fifteen Original Autograph Manuscript Poems by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (posthumous manuscript collection, Huntington Library) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1849-1865 ? 0 Poems and Sonnets (Fitzwilliam Museum bound volume of miscellaneous poems) DGR 1848-1881 0 M.S. Poetry 1869.70.71 (composite manuscript collection, Princeton/Taylor collection) Dante Gabriel Rossetti and others 1869-1871 0 The Works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1911) Dante Gabriel Rossetti William Michael Rossetti 1911 0