The Rossetti Legacy

This groundbreaking study reveals how the Rossetti siblings revolutionized Victorian conceptions of selfhood through a sophisticated dialectic that transcends conventional binaries - matter and spirit, sacred and secular love, strength and vulnerability, divinity and depravity. While their contemporaries remained trapped in Victorian doubleness, Dante Gabriel and Christina Rossetti boldly negotiated these opposing forces, creating a radical new synthesis that challenges our understanding of 19th-century thought. Their extraordinary fusion of matter and spirit - a deliberate departure from Victorian orthodoxy - resurrects a profound intellectual tradition extending from Renaissance humanism through Romantic idealism. This intellectual courage manifests most brilliantly in their pioneering integration of word and image: for Christina, this synthesis illuminates aesthetic-religious relationships through liturgical symbolism and ceremonial ritual; for Dante Gabriel, it achieves what Walter Pater recognized as the rare marriage of aesthetic brilliance with 'deep, philosophic reflectiveness'.  This comprehensive investigation penetrates the siblings' dialectical philosophies to expose unexpected affinities and crucial differences, establishing vital connections between their poetic principles and artistic innovations across all creative phases. The result is not merely a reinterpretation of the Rossettis, but a fundamental reconsideration of Victorian intellectual history and its enduring influence on modern consciousness.

Charlotte Xiaoqian Cai has degrees from Shanghai International Studies University (BA), the University of Leicester (MA), and the Chinese University of Hong Kong (PhD).

Introduction Chapter 1 Self-Renunciation and Self-Fulfilment: Interplay of Sacred Love and Secular Love in Monna Innominata and Later Life 1.1 Monna Innominata 1.1.1 First macro-quatrain: a quest for the beloved 1.1.2 Second macro-quatrain: agency via religion versus risk of idolatry 1.1.3 Macro-sestet: forgoing her beloved & retaining her love 1.2 Later Life 1.2.1 First macro-octave: pleas for grace & quest for agency 1.2.2 Second macro-octave: beginning to assume God's vision 1.2.3 First macro-sestet: through the seasons of human life 1.2.4 Second macro-sestet: dynamics among life, death, and love Chapter 2 Fluidity of Life, Love and Death in The House of Life 2.1 The Religion of Love 2.2 Confronting Death 2.3 Ambiguity of the Sirens and the Law of the Monochord 2.4 A Summary and a Comparison Chapter 3 The Aesthetics of Renunciation in Christina Rossetti's Double Works 3.1 Sing-Song: Calls for a Shift of Attention 3.2 Speaking Likenesses: Dynamics Between the Weak and the Strong 3.3 Goblin Market and Christina's Illustrations for The Christian Year: Siblinghood and Selfhood Chapter 4 Passion and Passivity: Fluidity of Identity in Dante Gabriel Rossetti's Double Works 4.1 Heavenly Lady or Femme Fatale 4.2 Transformations of Lady Lilith and Mary Magdalene 4.3 Modern Femme Fatale 4.4 The Constellation of Helen, Proserpine, and Pandora 4.5 A Summary and a Comparison Conclusio