Victorian Poetry:A Paper Collection by Cordelia Clark (e reader txt) 📖

/> The seduction of the goblin men implies dominance. As the goblin men are the seducers, they are the sexually dominant. Seduction begins in lines 79-80 with “they sounded kind and full of loves/in the pleasant weather.” Laura begins to loose willpower against them in 85-86 when she is compared to a ship that is being launched, which then has the capacity to be uncontrollable: “Like a vessel at the launch/when it’s last restraint is gone.” In the lines that follow, we see that the goblins sense Laura’s weakness:
When they reached where Laura was
They stood stock still upon the moss
Leering at each other
Brother with queer brother
Signaling each other
Brother with sly brother (91-96).
More seduction is in lines 107-108, where the goblins are said to speak in tones “smooth as honey:” “The whisk tailed merchant bade her taste/in tones as smooth as honey.”
The repetition of “evening by evening” is a description of Lizzie and Laura’s relationship. Superficially they seem to be the same because Laura first issues the warning about the goblin men, which Lizzie repeats later, which could be interpreted as the foreshadowing of the stanza discussing their similarities:
Golden head by golden head
Like two pigeons in one nest
Folded in each other’s wings
They lay down in their curtained bed
Like two blossoms on one stem
Like two flakes of new fallen snow
Like two wands of ivory
Tipped with gold for awful kings
Moon and stars gazed in at them
Wind sang to them a lullaby
Lumbering owls forbore to fly
Not a bad flapped to and fro
Round their nest
Cheek to cheek and breast to breast
Locked together in one nest (184-198).
This is also the first picture presented of Lizzie and Laura living so closely together, as they sleep in the same bed. Lesbianism and sexual corruption may be linked with the working class living arrangements. Michael Mason points out how this links together when he discusses how the working class lived more closely together than the upper class:
Patterns of occupation and settlement are themselves relevant to sexuality, especially in view of certain impressions of the day (concerning, for instance, the morals of factories verses farms and other domestic servants) but their main interest here is what they indicate about class structure (107).

He continues to discuss this on page 140, where he gives a more concrete example:

Riddall Wood does cite a pair of prostitutes who said that they had been corrupted by sharing accommodations with married couples. We also have, however, the very words of a prostitute from the home countries on this question, and her testimony is oddly half hearted: ‘If it hadn’t been that we were all forced to undress ourselves before one another, and five of us to sleep in the same room, I do think—though perhaps that wasn’t the only reason—that I should not be leading this life I am now. If there had been no one else sleeping in the same room I might perhaps have fallen into this way, but I don’t think I should have gone wrong so soon.’

This is relevant as Lizzie and Laura sleep in the same bed. This is referenced in line 184: “golden head by golden head.” The sexual corruption of class structure is also relevant because Lizzie, Laura, and Jeannie, who is only mentioned once (157-160) as having been seduced by goblin men and dying as a result, all lived intimately together.
It is difficult to classify Laura and Lizzie as far as social classes go, simply because they only sometimes adhere to working class criteria. They resemble the working class in that they have no money but barter instead, which alludes to production of goods in some form. This is seen in lines 105-106 when Laura barters with her hair: “Laura stared but did not stir/longed but had no money.” It is seen later that they work on some sort of a farm:
Early in the morning
When the first cock crowed his warning
Neat like bees, sweet and busy
Laura rose with Lizzie
Fetched in honey, milked the cows
Aired and set to rights the house
Kneaded cakes of whitest wheat
Cakes for dainty mouths to eat
Next churned butter, whipped up cream
Fed their pultry, sat and sewed (199-209).

Also, they resemble the working class with their crowded housing.
Golden head by golden head
Like two pigeons in one nest
Folded in each other’s wings
They lay down in their curtained bed (184-187).

Not only do Laura and Lizzie share a bed, but Jeannie also lived with them at one time. The fact that Lizzie buried her and keeps up her grave implies intimacy:

Then fell with the first snow
While to this day no grass will grow
Where she lies low
I planted daisies there a year ago (157-160).

However, Lizzie and Laura differ from the working class in that they marry in the end:
Marriage was not common among working people who on the whole obtained their wives and husbands simply by taking up residence with them (Harrison,167).

Lesbianism is evident but also purifying, as seen in the following lines:

She cried, Laura, up the glen
Did you miss me
Come and kiss me
Never mind my bruises
Hug me, kiss me, suck my juices
Squeezed from goblin fruits for you
Goblin pulp and goblin dew
Eat me, drink me, love me
Laura make much of me
For your sake I braved the glen
And had to do with goblin merchant men (464-474).

The purifying powers of their same sex relationship are seen in lines 485-492:
She clung about her sister
Kissed and kissed and kissed her
Tears once again
Refreshed her sunken eyes
Dropping like rain
After long sultry drought
Shaking with anguish fear and pain
She kissed and kissed her
With a hungry mouth.

In order for their relationship to be purifying, it had to burn out the sexual corruption coming from the goblin men. This is evident in lines 493-499:
Her lips began to scortch
That juice was wormwood to her tongue
She loathed the feast
Writhing as one possessed she leaped and sung
Rent all her robe and wrung
Her hands in lamentable haste
And beat her breast.

Purification is also shown in lines 507-511:
Swift fire spread through her veins knocked at her heart
Met the fire smoldering there
And overbore its lesser flame
She gorged on bitterness without a name.

This idea is supported by Leslie Atzmon’s article on goblins and in-betweens, where she declares that Laura is rescued by Lizzie:
In-betweens and goblins also characterize the illustration ‘White and Gold Where Lizzie stood’ from Goblin Market by Christina Rosetti. In Goblin Market, two sisters are tantalized by the forbidden fruit offered by a band of goblin men. Laura is tempted and succumbs, but ultimately is rescued by Lizzie. Lizzie enacts retribution for her sister’s capture by refusing to be tempted, therefore vanquishing the goblins (71).

Purification is also supported by David B. Drake:

A substantial number of critics have noted that Rosetti’s heroine, Lizzie, resembles a transfigured Christ who redeems her peccant sister by sacrificing herself to the malevolent goblins. Feminist critics, meanwhile, have designated Lizzie a pioneering member of their own movement who is earnestly determined to protect the sanctity of sisterhood against any form of patriarchal corruption (ie: goblin men). Inherent in both these persuasive exegeses is the understanding that Lizzie is an individual of heroic, or even cosmic consequence…and accordingly, her subsequent reemergence from this underworld clearly signifies a resurrection, not so much for herself, but for the moribund Laura, as well as for all maidens, since Lizzie (the seminal feminist) has emphatically demonstrated that they indeed possess more resourcefulness than the goblins, and consequently no longer need to be the victims of their misogynistic tyranny (22).
Thus, as Lizzie is the signifier of the seminal feminist and resurrects her female power in both herself and her sister, lesbianism is shown as a purifying force, rather than one to be ashamed of.
Lizzie and Laura marry in the end because that is what they are expected to do because of societal convention. However, they tell their children that “there is no friend like a sister.” Metaphorically this is the passing on of lesbian ideals to their children. Line 542 speaks briefly of their marriage: “afterwards both were wives.” They pass on lesbian ideals to their children in lines 558-560: “Then joining hands to little hands/would bid them cling together/for there is no friend like a sister.” Another way that lesbianism is justified, other than the fact that it is shown as purifying, is by the entire construct of the story. During the time period it was seen as a fairy story, and thus as it is told to the children as a fairy story it is used as a method of instruction. Mackenzie Bell cites in his biography of Christina Rosetti that William Michael Rosetti declares that “it is only a fairy story”(207). Fairy stories were often used for instruction, and still are today. An example of this is that Andrew Wright has several books on developing language with learners, and one, Storytelling With Children, deals with language development using fairy tales.
Atzmon points out that the Victorians were captivated by the idea of fairies and that the subconscious and otherwise “unnatural” feelings that were not allowed due to societal construction were allowed to come out when one was under the correct circumstances. This is related to the idea that the artistic depiction of the fey with animal like characteristics made them similar to humans in the that the fey were often involved in the emergence of the “unconscious” nature of the Victorian individual, which was seen as the part of the person that was the real personality.
Fairies captivated the Victorians, who flocked to exhibits of fairy art and lavish productions of plays involving fairies. Rackham’s believable but fantastic fairyland helped generate and sustain this fascination. Rackham’s popular illustrations played an important role in creating the Victorian images of fairies, simultaneously disclosing hidden implications for understanding the Victorian psyche. In this essay I will also discuss the ways in which Arthur Rackham’s fairies manifest, in visual form, both phrenological precepts and Victorian notions of the fearsome animalism of the unconscious mind (Atzmon,64).

Another support of the idea that the Victorians were captivated by the fey is that Lisa Steinweb mentions in her review of Carol G. Silver’s book, Strange and Secret Peoples: Fairies and Victorian Consciousness, that many Victorians placed fairy folk in their family trees.
Yet the Victorians traced their roots not only back to these ancient tribes, but the fairies themselves. Silver finds communities from the Herbides to Cornwall, who could place mermaids, selkies, and fairy brides in their family tree (151).

Atzmon may again be cited in order to tie in the Victorian’s feelings about the relationship between the fey and humanity:
Phrenologists also explored the faculties that animals share with humans. These primitive faculties include, among others, philoprogenitiveness—the love of offspring, concentrativeness—the ability to focus on one object; combativeness—tendency to self-protection and courage; destructiveness—the desire to meet and overcome obstacles;and secretiveness—the instinct to conceal unbecoming behavior and thoughts. These propensities are most relevant to this study of fairies—who are believed to be aboriginal in the best case, and animalistic in the worst, since the propensities superficially target those attributes common to both human and animals. This group of faculties was well known among British proponents of phrenology, their physical manifestations were clearly spelled out in phrenological guidelines (65).

Christina Rosetti describes the goblins with animal like characteristics when she speaks of one goblin having a cat’s face in line 71. Atzmon herself also relates this