Relationship With Rossetti's Family
As Siddal came from a working-class family, Rossetti feared introducing her to his parents. Lizzie Siddal was the victim of harsh criticism from his sisters. Knowledge that his family would not approve the marriage contributed to Rossetti putting it off. Siddal appears to have believed, with some justification, that Rossetti was always seeking to replace her with a younger muse, which contributed to her later depressive periods and illness.
Rossetti's relationship with Siddal is explored by Christina Rossetti in her poem "In an Artist's Studio":
- One face looks out from all his canvases,
- One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans:
- We found her hidden just behind those screens,
- That mirror gave back all her loveliness.
- A queen in opal or in ruby dress,
- A nameless girl in freshest summer-greens,
- A saint, an angel -- every canvas means
- The same one meaning, neither more nor less.
- He feeds upon her face by day and night,
- And she with true kind eyes looks back on him,
- Fair as the moon and joyful as the light:
- Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim;
- Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright;
- Not as she is, but as she fills his dream.
Read more about this topic: Elizabeth Siddal
Famous quotes containing the words relationship with, relationship, rossetti and/or family:
“Sisters is probably the most competitive relationship within the family, but once the sisters are grown, it becomes the strongest relationship.”
—Margaret Mead (1901–1978)
“It would be a fallacy to deduce that the slow writer necessarily comes up with superior work. There seems to be scant relationship between prolificness and quality.”
—Fannie Hurst (1889–1968)
“Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been;
I am also called No-more, Too-late, Farewell;”
—Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828–1882)
“The law is equal before all of us; but we are not all equal before the law. Virtually there is one law for the rich and another for the poor, one law for the cunning and another for the simple, one law for the forceful and another for the feeble, one law for the ignorant and another for the learned, one law for the brave and another for the timid, and within family limits one law for the parent and no law at all for the child.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)