Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Market: Text and

Context
(Semester-IV, CC-X : 19th Century British Literature)
Arindam Ghosh
Assistant Professor
Department of English
Krishna Chandra College
Hetampur, Bibhum
 Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, and their children as idealized family
Victorian Literature
Victorian literature is basically literature written during the reign of
Queen Victoria (1837–1901) (the Victorian era). It was preceded by
Romanticism and followed by the Edwardian era (1901–1910).
 Historical and Social Background of the Period
 A huge growth in population: During Victoria's reign, the population of
England more than doubled, from 14 million to 32 million.
 Improvements in technology: The Victorian era slightly overlaps with
Britain’s Industrial Revolution, which saw big changes to the way that
people lived, worked, and traveled. These improvements in technology
offered a lot of opportunities for the people in England but also
represented a major upheaval in regards to how people lived their lives
and interacted with the world.
 Changing World Views: Conflict Between Science and Religion: In
addition to the major developments in technology, there were emerging
scientific beliefs, like Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, and those
things were changing how people in England thought about themselves and
how they interacted with the world around them. Most notably, a lot of
people were distancing themselves from the church.
 Poor Conditions For The Working Class: The Industrial Revolution led
to the distance between the haves and have-nots growing at a really high
rate, and a lot of people (especially artists, like writers) felt obligated to
speak out against what they believed to be societal injustices.
 Victorian Morality
 Contemporary historians have generally come to regard the Victorian era as
a time of many conflicts, such as the widespread cultivation of an outward
appearance of dignity and restraint, together with serious debates about
exactly how the new morality should be implemented.
 The international slave trade was abolished, and this ban was enforced by
the Royal Navy. Slavery was ended in all the British colonies, child
labour was ended in British factories, and a long debate ensued regarding
whether prostitution should be totally abolished or tightly regulated.
 Homosexuality remained illegal.
 Characteristics of Victorian Poetry

 Some characteristics, or features, of Victorian poetry move poetry away

from the Romantic era poets. One such characteristic, or feature, is the
Victorian interest in Medieval legends, myths and fables over the classical
legends and mythology embraced by the preceding Romantic poets.
 Another is a more realistic and less idealized view of nature.
 There is a change of emphasis on what types of common people and
common language is emphasized in poetry: whereas for Romantics it was
the country rustic, for the Victorians it is more often the common urban
dweller.
 One of the main defining characteristics of Victorian poetry is that it is
pictorial, which means it uses detailed imagery to convey thoughts and
emotions. While many poets use imagery, the Victorians took this a step
further. They used sensory elements to describe abstract ideas such as the
struggles between religion and science.
 Victorian poetry is characterized by both religious skepticism, inherited from
the Romantic Period, but contrarily also devotional poetry that proclaims a
more mystical faith. Religion becomes more of a personal experience
expressed through poetry.
Major Authors of Victorian Period
 Victorian Poets

 One of the most significant accomplishments of the Victorian

Era is the appearance of female poets. There were few female
poets before, as poetry was considered to be predominantly male
occupation. Despite these views, works of such poets as
Elizabeth Browning, Christina Rossetti, and the Bronte
sisters became famous during The Victorian Age.
 Speaking about male poets, such figures as Alfred Tennyson,
Matthew Arnold and Robert Browning should be mentioned.
Among the Victorians, Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892) enjoyed
the greatest popularity. He wrote on a variety of topics,
including religion and ethics. His poetry responded to all the
issues and concerns of the Victorian society and reflected moods
and attitudes of the Britons.
 Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood
 The group sought a return to the abundant detail,
intense colours and complex compositions of
Quattrocento (1400-1499) Italian art. They
rejected what they regarded as the mechanistic
approach first adopted by Mannerist artists who
succeeded Raphael and Michelangelo.
 The Brotherhood believed the Classical poses and
elegant compositions of Raphael in particular had
been a corrupting influence on the academic
teaching of art, hence the name ―Pre-
Raphaelite‖. In particular, the group objected to the
influence of Sir Joshua Reynolds, founder of the
English Royal Academy of Arts, whom they called
―Sir Sloshua‖.
 The Pre-Raphaelites defined themselves as a reform
movement, created a distinct name for their form of
Proserpine (1874) art, and published a periodical, The Germ, to
by Dante Gabriel promote their ideas. The group’s debates were
Rossetti recorded in the Pre-Raphaelite Journal.
 Christina Georgina Rossetti (1830-1894)
 Christina Georgina Rossetti was born into an
artistic, well-educated Italian-English family.
Her father was a political exile, poet, and
translator, and her maternal uncle, John Polidori,
was a writer and physician to the famous
Romantic poet Lord Byron.
 The Rossetti household was intensely creative
and artistic. All three of her siblings were writers,
and her brother, Dante Gabriel, helped found the
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, one of the most
influential artistic movements of the Victorian
period. Although not an official member, Rossetti
collaborated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood,
contributing poetry to their journal, The Germ,
under the pen name Ellen Alleyn, and modelling
for their paintings.
 Rossetti grew more devoutly religious. Choosing
to remain single, she led a relatively restricted
Christina Rossetti, by her life devoted to poetry, religion, and
brother Dante Gabriel Rossetti companionship with her mother and aunts.
 The Rossetti
Family by
Lewis Carroll

 Between 1859 and 1870, Rossetti volunteered with the Church

Penitentiary Movement, which offered a home, religious instruction, and
training to women who were formerly prostitutes. The experience
influenced her thoughts about fallen women and may have influenced
―Goblin Market,‖ which she published in 1862.
 During her lifetime, Rossetti had an excellent literary reputation in both the
U.S. and the UK, where she was considered as a possible candidate for Poet
Laureate following Tennyson’s death in 1892. Rossetti died in 1894, and
today she is recognized as one of the finest poets of the nineteenth century.
  Goblin Market and Other Poems is Christina
Rossetti's first volume of poetry, published by
Macmillan in 1862. It contains her famous
poem ―Goblin Market‖ and others such as
Up-hill, The Convent Threshold, and Maude
Clare. It also includes the poem In the Round
Tower at Jhansi, 8 June 1857, in which a
British army officer takes his wife's life and
his own so that they do not have to face a
horrific and dishonourable death at the
hands of the rebelling sepoys,
commemorating the Jhokan Bagh
massacre at Jhansi.
 Christina’s brother, founding Pre-Raphaelite
Brotherhood member Dante Gabriel Rossetti,
designed the frontispiece and title page
illustrations in the first edition, as well as
Illustration for the cover of Christina the minimal blue binding. Christina was
Rossetti's Goblin Market and Other acknowledged that her brother's ―commercial
Poems (1862), by her brother Dante savvy and artistic skill‖ helped make her
Gabriel Rossetti first volume of poetry a success.
 Overview of the Poem
 Author
Christina Rosetti
 Year Published
1862
 Genre
Narrative Poem, Allegory, Fairy Tales, Fantasy
 Perspective and Narrator
"Goblin Market" has a third-person omniscient speaker.
 Tense
"Goblin Market" is told in the past tense.
 About the Title
Goblin Market is a reference to the marketplace that appears to the
speaker at twilight, the liminal, or transitional, period between day and
night. The marketplace is where the goblins sell delicious foods
unavailable anywhere else. The maidens who sample their wares waste
away, pining for the exotic flavors.
  Goblin Market (composed in April 1859
and published in 1862) is a narrative
poem by Christina Rossetti. The poem tells
the story of Laura and Lizzie who are
tempted with fruit by goblin merchants. In a
letter to her publisher, Rossetti claimed that
the poem, which is interpreted frequently
as having features of remarkably sexual
imagery, was not meant for children.
 However, in public Rossetti often stated that
the poem was intended for children, and
went on to write many children’s poems.
When the poem appeared in her first volume
of poetry, Goblin Market and Other Poems,
it was illustrated by her brother, the Pre-
Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Raphaelite Brotherhood artist Dante
Market and other Poems with Gabriel Rossetti.
Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s  Goblin Market tells the adventures of two
frontispiece and title page
close sisters, Laura and Lizzie, with the
designs, 1865.
river goblins.
 Goblin
 A goblin is a monstrous creature
from European folklore, first
attested in stories from the Middle
Ages. They are ascribed various and
conflicting abilities, temperaments and
appearances depending on the story
and country of origin.
 They are almost always small and
grotesque, mischievous or outright
malicious, and greedy, especially for
gold and jewelry. They often have
magical abilities similar to a fairy or
demon. Similar creatures include
Goblin illustration by John D. brownies, dwarfs, duendes, gnomes,
Batten from "English Fairy imps, and kobolds.
Tales" (19th century)
 Summary of the Poem
 Although the two sisters: Laura and Lizzie
seem to be quite young, they live by
themselves in a house, and draw water every
evening from a stream.
 As the poem begins, the sisters hear the calls
of the goblin merchants selling their
fantastic fruits in the twilight.
 On this evening, Laura, intrigued by their
strangeness, lingers at the stream after her
sister goes home. (Rossetti hints that the
"goblin men" resemble animals with faces
like wombats or cats, and with tails.)
 Longing for the goblin fruits but having no
money, the impulsive Laura offers to pay a
lock of her hair and "a tear more rare
than pearl.―
 Laura gorges on the delicious fruit in a sort of
Coloured illustration in Goblin bacchic frenzy. Once finished, she returns
Market and other poems home in an ecstatic trance, carrying one of
the seeds.
 Summary of the Poem
 At home, Lizzie is ―full of wise upbraidings‖,
reminding Laura of Jeanie, another girl who
partook of the goblin fruits, and then died at the
beginning of winter after a long and pathetic
decline. Strangely, no grass grows over Jeanie's
grave.
 Laura dismisses her sister's worries, and plans to
return the next night to get more fruits for herself and
Lizzie. The sisters go to sleep in their shared bed.
 The next day, as Laura and Lizzie go about their
housework, Laura dreamily longs for the coming
meeting with the goblins.
 That evening, however, as she listens at the stream,
Laura discovers to her horror that, although her sister
still hears the goblins' chants and cries, she cannot.
 Unable to buy more of the forbidden fruit, Laura
sickens and pines for it. As winter approaches, she
withers and ages unnaturally, too weak to do her
Coloured illustration in Goblin chores. One day she remembers the saved seed and
Market and other poems plants it, but nothing grows.
 Summary of the Poem
 Months pass, and Lizzie realizes that Laura is
wasting to death. Lizzie resolves to buy some of
the goblin fruit for Laura. Carrying a silver
penny, Lizzie goes down to the brook and is
greeted warmly by the goblins, who invite her
dine. But when they realize that she means to
pay with mere silver, and to give the fruits to
her sister, they turn upon the girl and beat her,
trying to feed her their fruits by force. Lizzie is
drenched with the juice and pulp, but consumes
none of it.
 Lizzie escapes and runs home, but when the
dying Laura eats the pulp and juice from her
body, the taste repulses rather than satisfies her,
and she undergoes a terrifying paroxysm.
 By morning, however, Laura is fully restored to
The Princess and the Goblin
health. The last stanza attests that both Laura and
by George MacDonald,
Lizzie live to tell their children of the evils of
illustrated by Jessie Willcox
the goblins' fruits, and of the power of sisterly
Smith, 1920
love.
 List of Characters in Goblin Market
Character Description
Laura is one of two sisters who watch the goblins at
Laura twilight. She stays longer to watch the goblins and falls
prey to them.
Lizzie is one of two sisters who watch the goblins at
Lizzie
twilight. She flees from temptation.
Jeanie is the deceased girl in the story Lizzie tells
Jeanie Laura. She watched the goblins and fell prey to them,
resulting in her death.
The goblin men try to lure girls with their forbidden
fruit, which, when eaten, causes them to wither and
Goblins ultimately die. Laura falls prey to their seduction while
Lizzie resists it, visiting them in the end to save her
sister.
 Sources of the Poem
 Two potential sources of the goblin imagery
that Rossetti employs are the poem ―The
Fairies‖ by William Allingham and Thomas
Keightly’s The Fairy Mythology.
 In The Fairy Mythology Keightley collects
tales from various cultures, including
Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream.
In this play readers meet the fairy Puck and
the fairy queen Titania, who tells her elves to
―feed him with apricocks and dewberries, /
With purple grapes, green figs, and
mulberries‖. These lines tie to the Rossetti
poem inextricably.
 ―The Fairies‖ by William Allingham also
includes related imagery. The poem's speaker
says, ―We daren't go a-hunting / For fear of
Illustration in Goblin Market little men; / Wee folk, good folk, / Trooping all
and other poems together.‖
 Meter & Rhyme
 ―Goblin Market‖ does not use a set meter or
rhyme. Victorian art critic John Ruskin
criticized this aspect of the poem at its release,
stating that Rossetti ought to "exercise herself in
the severest commonplace meter until she can
write as the public like.―
 This choice is not a weakness, however. ―Goblin
Market‖ is a narrative poem in experimental
form.
 Dactylic refers to a stressed syllable followed
by two unstressed ones, and trochaic refers to
a stressed syllable followed by one unstressed
one .
 So these lines have a distinctive rhythm:
Come buy our or-chard fruits, (DUM-da-da, DUM-
da-da)
Come buy, come buy (DUM-da, DUM-da)
Ap-ples and quin-ces, (DUM-da-da, DUM-da)
Lem-ons and or-anges" (DUM-da-da, DUM-da-da)
 The Idea of Fallen Women
 According to the Victorian mindset, whether a
woman was seduced, was raped, prostituted
herself, or chose to have a sexual relationship,
she was ―fallen‖ if she engaged in sexual activity
outside of marriage. Thus she suffered a loss of
social standing. (Modern readers will note that
responsibility for a woman's lack of virginity fell
solely on the woman.)
 Activists who tried to help ―fallen‖ women
employed various tactics, such as providing
pamphlets on morality and running homes such as
St. Mary Magdalene (also called Highgate
House), where women could live in a community
and learn skills to help them earn a living.
 As Victoria Bates notes in her 2016 study Sexual
Forensics in Victorian and Edwardian England:
Age, Crime and Consent in the Courts, the
accepted myth was that ―pubescent and adult
females were untrustworthy unless absolutely
chaste and flawless of character‖.
 The Idea of Fallen Women
 In Goblin Market, Lizzie remains pure,
even when faced with temptation of the
forbidden fruit and faced with the
onslaught of goblin men trying to force
her to "fall." The imagery is not subtle:
"White and golden Lizzie stood, /
Like a lily in a flood,— / Like a rock
of blue-vein'd stone / Lash'd by tides
obstreperously,— / Like a beacon left
alone / In a hoary roaring sea."
Ultimately the goblins are ―worn out by
her resistance‖, and she returns to the
ailing sister with the ―cure‖.
 Laura falls, and Lizzie redeems her—
just as Rossetti sought to do for the
women at Highgate House.
Textual Analysis
Summary:
Each morning and evening young women hear
the cry of the goblin men, who encourage the
women to ―come buy‖ their fruit. The goblins
sell a variety of exotic, luscious-sounding fruits
that they describe in sensuous terms, including
―plump unpeck’d cherries,‖ ―bloom-down-cheek’d
peaches,‖ ―wild free-born cranberries,‖ and ―figs
to fill your mouth.‖ The goblins boast of the
sweetness and beauty of their offerings, which
they encourage women to ―taste.‖
Critical Comments:
Where the goblins come from and why they target
women is never explained. The way the goblins
describe their fruit is pointedly sexual and
suggestive of ripeness and voluptuousness. The
goblins’ evocative language is intended to
seduce women by encouraging them to imagine
the pleasures of eating their fruit.
Summary:
One evening, two young sisters, Laura and Lizzie,
hear the goblins’ call as they are collecting water
from a brook. Laura bows her head to better hear their
call and Lizzie blushes, although she tries to hide it.
With ―tingling cheeks and finger tips,‖ they crouch
close together for protection and clasp arms. Laura
urges Lizzie to ―lie close,‖ and warns her that they
―must not look at goblin men‖ and ―must not buy
their fruits‖ because they do not know in what
foreign regions the fruit has grown. Yet, hearing the
goblins’ call, Laura ―pricks‖ up her ―golden head.‖
Critical Comments:
At this point in the poem, it is unclear exactly why the
goblins are so dangerous, but both sisters seem
instinctively to recognize that the goblins pose a
sexual threat. Rossetti’s language in this passage
emphasizes the sisters’ bodily response to the goblins.
―Tingling cheeks and fingertips‖ suggest they are
fearful, but also curious, and sexual curiosity was
believed by many Victorians to be dangerous to
women.
Summary:
Lizzie cries out, warning her sister not to ―peep‖ and
covering her own eyes ―lest they should look,‖ but
Laura rears ―her glossy head‖ and continues to gaze at
the goblin men as they tramp and hobble down the glen
toward the sisters. Transfixed, Laura encourages
Lizzie to open her eyes and watch the goblins
proceed. She begins to describe their movements and
the dishes, baskets, and plates they are carrying, and to
speculate—now longingly rather than fearfully—on the
environment in which the ―luscious‖ fruit was grown,
imagining ―How warm the wind must blow / Thro’
those fruit bushes.‖
Critical Comments:
The exotic nature of the fruit, which initially
frightens Laura, now excites her—this plays into
European fears of foreigners (particular those from
colonized nations) as being primitive, sinful, and
overly sexual. By giving in to temptation and satisfying
her sexual curiosity, Laura is transgressing the
boundaries of acceptable behavior for women at the
time.
Summary:
Lizzie, however, refuses to look. Thrusting a ―dimpled
finger‖ in each ear and closing her eyes, Lizzie runs
away. The ―curious Laura,‖ however, is transfixed, and
makes the decision to linger in the glen with the goblins.
Laura watches as the goblin men approach her, and takes
notice of each goblin’s appearance. Not only do their
bodies share characteristics in common with animals,
including a cat, a rat, a snail, a wombat, and a ratel, but
some of the goblins’ voices sound like the cooing of doves:
soft, kind, and pleasant.
Critical Comments:
Lizzie is not just fearful of the goblins and the
consequences of eating their fruit, but also of the strength
of her own sexual desire and curiosity. This fear is so
strong that Lizzie abandons her own sister. Some of the
animals are commonplace but distinctly predatory, like the
cat, and may suggest that the goblins intend to take young
women for their prey. Interestingly, Holman Hunt’s famous
painting of a fallen woman, The Awakening Conscience
(1853), includes the image of a cat playing with a bird
before killing it, symbolizing the predatory behavior of
men who seduce women and then discard them.
  The Awakening Conscience (1853) is an oil-
on-canvas painting by the English artist
William Holman Hunt, one of the founders of
the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, which
depicts a young woman rising from her
position in the lap of a man and gazing
transfixed out of the window of a room.
 Initially, the painting appears to depict a
momentary disagreement between husband
and wife, but the title and a host of symbols
within the painting make it clear that this is
a mistress and her lover. The woman's
clasped hands provide a focal point and the
position of her left hand emphasizes the
absence of a wedding ring, although rings
are worn on every other finger. Around the
room are dotted reminders of her "kept" status
and her wasted life: the cat beneath the table
toying with a bird; the clock concealed
The Awakening Conscience under glass; a tapestry which hangs
(1853) by William Holman Hunt unfinished on the piano; the threads which lie
unravelled on the floor
Summary:
Laura stretches her ―gleaming neck‖ towards the goblin
men, like a swan or ―a vessel at the launch / When its
last restraint is gone.‖ Meanwhile, the goblins are
tramping backwards up the glen, continuing to call out,
―Come buy, Come buy.‖ Their cries have become
intensified and urgent, and instead of sounding like
cooing doves, they are ―shrill.‖ Upon reaching Laura,
they leer and slyly signal to one another. The goblins
set out their wares before Laura. One weaves a crown
of exotic tendrils, nuts, and leaves (―Men sell not such
in any town‖), while another heaves a heavy golden
dish laden with fruit to offer her. Still, they continue
to cry out ―come buy, come buy.‖
Critical Comments:
This is the moment when Laura loses her self-
restraint, which previously made her cautious of the
goblin men. It is presented as a point of no return. The
goblins’ slyness suggests that they intend to trick or
deceive Laura in some way, while the word ―leer,‖
meaning to look at in an unpleasant and lascivious
way, emphasizes that their trick has a sexual element.
Summary:
Laura stares, but does not move. She desires the
fruit but has no money to offer in exchange.
Nevertheless, the goblin merchants continue to
try to tempt her to sample their fruit without
paying. One speaks in ―tones as smooth as honey,‖
while others purr, speak to her in a friendly way,
and jollily call out like a parrot ―Pretty Goblin‖
instead of ―Pretty Polly.‖ Laura knows that she
ought not to accept the fruit without being able to
pay. She hastily explains this to the goblins,
regretting that she has no coin to offer in exchange
and that to accept their fruit under these conditions
would be to steal or to purloin it. As she explains,
the only ―gold‖ she has is ―on the furze,‖ in the
natural world. The goblins, however, point to
Laura’s golden hair as an adequate payment and
urge her to clip one of her curls to offer in
exchange for the fruit. Laura agrees and clips the
desired lock of hair, dropping ―a tear more rare
than pearl.‖
Critical Comments:
 Laura explains that she cannot pay because all her ―gold is on the furze,‖
another name for gorse: a yellow, floral shrub. This statement emphasizes
Laura’s relationship to the natural world, which, like other sources of
wealth, keeps her fed and sustained. It is also suggestive of her rural
innocence and inexperience.
 Refusing to accept Laura’s reasons for not taking the fruit, the goblins
persuade her to cut a lock of her hair to offer in exchange. In doing so,
the goblins symbolically transform Laura’s hair into a commodity with
commercial value. She symbolically sells herself for the forbidden fruit,
and this act strongly aligns her with the fallen woman in Victorian
culture.
Summary:
Laura immediately begins to suck the fruit that is presented
to her. The fruits’ flavor is unlike anything she has ever
tasted, ―Sweeter than honey from the rock, / Stronger than
man-rejoicing wine.‖ No matter how much she eats, she
does not grow tired of its flavor. It does not satisfy her
hunger either. She continues to suck at the fruit until her lips
are sore and she is in a state of total bewilderment. When
she finishes gorging on the fruit, Laura flings the rinds
away and gathers up a kernel stone or fruit pit to bring
home with her. Unaware of her surroundings and whether
it is night or day, Laura makes her way home alone. When
she arrives, Lizzie is waiting for her at the garden gate,
and proceeds to scold her with ―wise upbraidings.‖
Critical Comments:
The phrases ―honey from the rock‖ and ―man-rejoicing
wine‖ allude to God’s provision of good things for his
faithful followers. That the goblin fruit seems sweeter than
that honey and stronger than that wine suggests that its
goodness is only an illusion and that in accepting and
preferring it, Laura is being led away from God. Lizzie’s
scolding is useless because the fruit has already poisoned
Laura’s mind and destroyed her peace.
Summary:
Lizzie again warns Laura of the dangers of loitering in
the glen at midnight because it is haunted by goblin
men. Lizzie asks Laura if she remembers the fate of
Jeanie, who met the goblins in the moonlight,
accepted their gifts, ate their fruit, and wore their
flowers, but then pined away when the goblins
abandoned her. Jeanie’s hair grew grey before she died
in her prime. No grass will grow upon Jeanie’s grave,
nor will the daisies that Lizzie planted there a year ago.
Lizzie finishes her lesson by reiterating that Laura
should not loiter in the dark glen with the dangerous
goblin men.
Critical Comments:
Lizzie’s cautionary tale about Jeanie, who ate their fruit,
was abandoned, it reflects a common trajectory for
fallen women in Victorian literature and art, one in
which they experience a sexual ―fall,‖ are abandoned by
their seducers, and eventually die. The barrenness of
Jeanie’s grave, on which no vegetation will grow,
symbolizes the way that the goblins have robbed her of
opportunities for marriage and motherhood—which
the Victorians viewed as the ideal state for women.
Summary:
Laura, however, dismisses her sister’s concerns,
telling her to ―hush.‖ Laura explains that
although she ate her fill of goblin fruit, her
mouth still waters for it, and so she has resolved
to meet the goblins on the following night in
order to purchase more. Laura tries to reassure
her sister of the fruit’s goodness. Kissing Lizzie,
she describes with rapture the delicious and varied
fruit she sampled: plums, cherries, figs, melons,
peaches, and grapes, and she speculates about
their growing conditions. She offers to bring
them home to her sister on the following night.
Critical Comments:
Laura does not yet realize the danger she is in, but
her admission that she still hungers for the fruit
despite eating a great deal of it alerts the reader
to this danger. The sensuous language Laura uses
to describe the fruit to Lizzie is also significant. As
if adopting the goblins’ way of speaking, Laura
tries to tempt Lizzie with the offer of fruit.
Summary:
The two sisters then retire to sleep in the same bed,
―Golden head by golden head,‖ and with their arms
enfolding one another. They are lulled to sleep by the
wind and their peaceful slumber is undisturbed by the
sound of owls and bats. They sleep ―Cheek to cheek and
breast to breast.‖ The following morning, Laura and
Lizzie awaken to the sound of a cock crowing.
Immediately, they begin their usual chores: fetching
honey, milking cows and feeding livestock, cleaning and
airing their home, preparing food, and sewing. While
their talk appears to be typical of ―modest maidens,‖
Lizzie is content while Laura is absent-minded and
sick with longing for the goblin fruit.
Critical Comments:
The profound peacefulness of the sisters’ slumber is the
calm before the storm. The sisters are presented as model
homemakers in the style of the so-called ―Angel in the
House,‖ an important Victorian cultural figure created
and popularized by Coventry Patmore. According to
nineteenth-century mores, ideal women were supposed to be
meticulous household managers
Summary:
Finally, evening arrives and Laura and Lizzie
set out with their pitchers to draw water from
the brook. While Lizzie is calm and
untroubled, Laura is eager for another
encounter with the goblins. Lizzie initially
occupies herself by picking purple and golden
―flags,‖ but as the sun sets, she encourages
Laura to return home with her, noting that ―not
another maiden lags,‖ and observing that the
animals are all at rest.
Critical Comments:
Lizzie’s gathering of flags, or irises, might
also be an allusion to Mary, the mother of
Jesus. According to floriology, or the
symbolic language of flowers, irises are
symbols of the Virgin Mary. Once commonly
called ―sword lilies,‖ the iris is associated with
the pain that pierced Mary when Jesus was
crucified. In Lizzie’s hand, irises seem to
foreshadow her act of self-sacrifice for her
sister.
Summary:
Laura refuses to come away, loitering among the
rushes in hope that the goblins will return. She
tells Lizzie that it is still early and the dew has
not yet fallen. Although she listens for the
goblins’ cry, she never hears them. Lizzie,
however, becomes alarmed when she hears the
goblins, and again urges Laura to come home with
her: ―I hear the fruit-call but I dare not look.‖
Laura, on hearing this, turns ―cold as stone.‖
Realizing that she cannot buy the fruit she so
desperately craves distresses her, but she does
not reveal her sorrow to her sister. She trudges
home with Lizzie and goes to bed. Waiting until
Lizzie is asleep, Laura weeps and gnashes her
teeth in despair.
Critical Comments:
Laura is heartbroken at discovering that she cannot hear
the call of the goblin men and, therefore, cannot buy
their fruit. Like Jeanie before her, the goblins have
abandoned Laura after giving her a tantalizing taste of
their forbidden fruit. Laura conceals her despair from
Lizzie, perhaps because Lizzie has already warned her
about the goblins, but perhaps also because Laura feels
ashamed of the strength of her desire. Again, Laura is
aligned with the figure of the fallen woman in
Victorian culture, who is often represented as
consumed with regret and despair, especially after
she has been forsaken by her seducer.
Summary:
For several days and nights, Laura silently
keeps watch in hope that the goblins will
reappear, but she never sees or hears them
again. In her sorrow and anxiety, Laura
becomes decrepit and her hair turns thin
and gray. One day, she remembers the
kernel stone that she brought back with her
from her first meeting with the goblins. She
plants it in a sunny spot and waters it
with her tears, but it will not grow fruit.
As Laura becomes weaker and older
looking, she dreams of the fruit in the way
that a traveler in the desert dreams of an
oasis and becomes thirstier. After this,
Laura neglects the household tasks that
she previously shared with her sister, no
longer cleaning, tending to the livestock,
cooking, or even drawing water from the
brook. Instead, she sits, ―listless in the
chimney-nook,‖ and does not eat.
Critical Comments:
 Without the goblin fruit, Laura is overcome with grief. Her
once golden hair is transformed, becoming thin and gray
like an old woman’s—just as Jeanie’s did. Laura’s hair is
an extension of herself and a reflection of her spiritual,
emotional, and physical health—or unwellness in this
instance. Furthermore, Laura’s inability to grow more fruit
suggests that she has become, in some sense, barren and
unable to support life. If the goblins’ exotic fruit represents
a desire for forbidden things that were deemed
unacceptable for women at the time, the fruit also makes
it impossible for Laura to survive in her once
accustomed role as a domestic woman.
Summary:
Lizzie, full of tenderness for her sister, can
no longer bear to see Laura suffering.
Unlike Laura, Lizzie continues to hear
the goblins’ cry each night and morning.
Lizzie longs to buy the goblins’ fruit to
comfort Laura but fears the consequences
of this. She remembers the fate of Jeanie,
who ―should have been a bride;/ But who
for joys brides hope to have/ Fell sick and
died‖ in the prime of her life. Eventually,
Laura’s health deteriorates so
dramatically that she seems to be on the
verge of death. Lizzie then stops
deliberating. She puts a silver penny in her
purse, kisses Laura goodbye, crosses the
heath at twilight, and goes in search of the
goblin men at the brook. For the first time
in her life, she listens and looks around her.
Critical Comments:
Laura’s overwhelming desire for the goblin fruit
causes her to age prematurely. She refuses food, begins
to waste away, and is brought to the brink of death. At this
point, cautious Lizzie overcomes her fear of the goblin
men and of the consequences of interacting them and
decides to meet the goblins at nightfall to purchase fruit
for Laura. Lizzie prepares for this act of sisterly self-
sacrifice by putting a silver penny in her purse to use
as payment, showing that she is more cautious and
aware of the goblins’ threat than Laura was.
Summary:
The goblins laugh to find Lizzie looking for them.
They hobble, run, and fly toward her, noisy and
grimacing. They hug, kiss, squeeze, and caress
her, stretching out dishes and plates and inviting her
to look at and taste their luscious fruits. They
seductively invite Lizzie to ―Bob at our cherries‖
and ―Bite at our peaches,‖ urging her to ―Pluck them
and suck them,‖ but Lizzie, remembering the fate of
Jeanie, does not eat. Instead, she holds out her
apron and asks them to fill it with fruit, then
tosses them a penny with which to pay.
Critical Comments:
The goblins try to tempt her, describing their
fruit in a deliberately sexual way and urging
Lizzie to imagine its taste and the feel of the fruit in
her mouth. Lizzie refuses their offers, however, and
instead attempts to purchase the fruit, tossing them a
silver penny as payment.
Summary:
The goblins try to persuade Lizzie to sit and eat with them,
protesting that their feast has just started and reassuring her
that the night is early and warm. They warn Lizzie that the
fruit will lose its juiciness and flavor if it is transported from
the glen. Lizzie continues to refuse, however, explaining that
Laura is waiting at home for her, and she tells the goblins to
toss her back her penny if they will not sell her the fruit. The
goblins, confused and angry, begin to insult her and accuse
her of pride and incivility. Their once sweet toned voices
become loud and their looks become ―evil.‖ Their anger
escalates and they begin to attack Lizzie, pulling out her hair
by the roots, clawing at her body, stamping on her feet, ripping
her gown, and attempting to force their fruit into her mouth to
make her eat.
Critical Comments:
Lizzie’s determination to pay for the fruit with money, rather than
offering a lock of her hair as payment (like Laura) or accepting
the fruit as a gift or debt (like Jeanie) is significant. If read
symbolically through the lens of nineteenth-century anxieties
about women’s sexuality, Lizzie refuses to become ―fallen,‖
Their attack, during which they batter Lizzie’s body and attempt
to cram food into her mouth, strongly evokes a sexual assault or
attempted rape.
Summary:
Lizzie resists their attack, like ―a beacon left alone/ In
a hoary roaring sea,/ Sending up a golden fire,‖ or
―Like a royal virgin town/ Topped with gilded dome
and spire/ Close beleaguered by a fleet/ Mad to tug her
standard down.‖ Though the goblins try various
tactics to make her eat, pinching, scratching,
coaxing and mocking her, Lizzie withstands their
attack, refusing to open her mouth and eat: she
―Would not open lip from lip/ Lest they should cram a
mouthful in.‖ Instead, she internally laughs to feel the
fruit juices covering her face and neck. Finally, the
goblins are worn out by Lizzie’s resistance. They
fling back her penny, kick their fruit home and
disappear, leaving Lizzie victorious.
Critical Comments:
Lizzie is described at length using imagery that
symbolizes strength, purity, and moral uprightnes.s
There is numerous allusions to Lizzie’s white skin,
golden hair, and innate purity and which also seems to
align her with Christian cities under siege by
invading forces.
Summary:
With an aching body and in a mental daze, Lizzie
runs home. She is no longer afraid of the goblins but
pleased to have escaped with her coin. Her kind
intentions to help Laura cause her to quicken her
pace. When she reaches the garden, she cries out to
Laura: ―Did you miss me?/ Come and kiss me./
Never mind my bruises,/ Hug me, kiss me, suck my
juices.‖ She explains that for Laura’s sake, she has
braved an encounter with the dangerous goblin men
and invites her sister to ―Eat me, drink me, love me.‖
Critical Comments:
it suggests that Lizzie’s sacrifice will undo or
reverse the damage caused to her sister by eating
the fruit, bringing them back to the idyllic, peaceful
lives they previously enjoyed. In light of the poem’s
many biblical resonances, it is also possible to read
this moment of mirroring as alluding to the
traditional Christian belief that Mary was the
second Eve who reversed the curses brought on
humanity by the first Eve’s disobedience to God.
Lizzie, aligned with Mary, saves her fallen sister,
Laura, who is aligned with Eve.
Summary:
Laura leaps up from her chair and pulls
at her hair. She fearfully asks Lizzie if
she has eaten the goblins’ fruit and
wonders whether her sister will begin
to wither and age as she has. She fears
that Lizzie’s life will be ruined and
wasted like her own.
Critical Comments:
On hearing that Lizzie braved a
meeting with the goblin men, Laura is
distraught, and begins tearing her hair
in grief. She fears that Lizzie will
become dejected, listless, and
withered just as she has become.
Summary:
Clinging to her sister, Laura begins to kiss
Lizzie. With that kiss, tears return to refresh
Laura’s once-dry and shrunken eyes. Shaking
with pain, Laura continues to kiss Lizzie ―with
a hungry mouth.‖ Laura’s lips begin to
―scorch‖ as she sucks the juices from her
sister’s face, and the once deliciously sweet
fruit becomes bitter and repulsive like
―wormwood.‖ Like someone ―possessed,‖
Laura writhes, leaps, sings, and tears at her
clothing. Laura’s ―locks streamed like the
torch/ Borne by a racer at full speed,‖ and she
now looks ―like a caged thing freed.‖ A ―Swift
fire spread[s] thro’ her veins‖ as she continues
to gorge on the bitter fruit juice. She then falls
down, unconscious, ―Like the watch-tower of a
town/ Which an earthquake shatters down.‖ It
is not immediately clear if Laura is dead or
alive.
Critical Comments:
 Sucking the fruit juices from her sister’s battered body, which she
―kissed and kissed‖ ―with a hungry mouth,‖ Laura begins to revive.
This miraculous moment of healing, brought about by Lizzie’s Christ-
like act of self-sacrifice, is also sexually charged and homoerotic,
indicating that the poem lends itself to more complex readings
than just religious allegory or fairytale.
 When sucked from her sister’s body, the delicious but poisonous fruit
is transformed into a bitter but restorative medicine. After Laura
drinks it, she seemingly loses control of her body, leaping and
writhing like one possessed.
 In contrast to the erect, upright imagery associated with Lizzie’s
ability to withstand the goblin attack, Laura is compared to towers that
crumble during an earthquake and a ship’s mast struck by lightning.
Like Christ, who withstood crucifixion and death before rising from
the dead to eternal life, Laura seems temporarily to succumb to the
ordeal and drops down as if dead.
Summary:
Throughout the night, Lizzie keeps
watch over Laura. She takes on the
role of a nurse, counting Laura’s pulse
and checking her breathing, giving
her water and cooling her face with
tears. When morning arrives, heralded
by the sounds of birds and agricultural
workers and the opening of flowers,
Laura awakens transformed. She
laughs in her old innocent way and
embraces Lizzie. Her hair returns to its
golden color, showing ―not one thread of
grey,‖ and her youthfulness is restored.
Critical Comments:
Laura’s life, which seemed to be at risk,
has dawned again. Her hair has been
restored to its golden color, signifying
the return of her health, joy, and peace
of mind.
Summary:
Years pass, during which Laura and Lizzie
have become wives and mothers, and they
worry about the safety of their children.
Laura calls the children to her and tells
them pleasant stories of her girlhood.
However, she also tells them about her
dangerous encounter with the ―wicked,
quaint fruit-merchant men,‖ whose fruits
were ―like honey to the throat/ But poison in
the blood.‖ She tells the children about how
Lizzie saved her by risking her life and
braving an attack from the goblin men.
Then Laura, ―joining hands to little hands,‖
tells the children to ―cling together‖: ―For
there is no friend like a sister/ In calm or
stormy weather;/ To cheer one on the tedious
way,/ To fetch one if one goes astray,/ To lift
one if one totters down,/ To strengthen whilst
one stands.‖
Critical Comments:
 That both Laura and Lizzie become wives and mothers is
significant. In many nineteenth-century narratives and
works of art, fallen women die, are transported out of
England and into the colonies, or are otherwise denied
opportunities for marriage and motherhood—which,
together, were commonly viewed as the ideal state for women
at that time.
 With Laura and Lizzie, Rossetti seems to counter the
pervasive message that fallen women were largely
irredeemable. Laura’s instruction to her own and Lizzie’s
daughters to support one another and cling together ―For
there is no friend like a sister,‖ creates a vision of female
solidarity and care to counter the dangers of predatory
(goblin) men.
 The Structure of the Goblin Market

Temptation

Redemption
The Fall

Rescue
Consequences
Basic Concepts related to Gender Studies
 Gender Role/Gender Stereotyping
A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing
a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered
acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for people based on their
biological or perceived sex. Gender roles are usually centered on
conceptions of masculinity and femininity.
 Proto-feminism
 Protofeminism is a philosophical
tradition that anticipates modern
feminism in an era when the concept of
feminism was still unknown.
 Around 24 centuries ago, Plato,
according to Elaine Hoffman Baruch,
―[argued] for the total political and
sexual equality of women, advocating
that they be members of his highest
class, ... those who rule and fight‖.
 Italian-French writer Christine de
Pizan (1364 – c. 1430), the author of
The Book of the City of Ladies and
Epistle to the God of Love is cited by
Simone de Beauvoir as the first woman
Christine de Pizan presents her to denounce misogyny and write about
book to Queen Isabeau of Bavaria the relation of the sexes.
Symbols
  In ―Goblin Market,‖ women’s hair functions as a
Golden Hair symbol of their purity and health—both spiritual
and physical. At the start of the poem, Laura and
Lizzie are both described as having golden hair, a
desirable color during the nineteenth century and
one that was often associated with youth, beauty,
and purity in the literature of the time. Laura’s
hair, in particular, might also be read as an
allusion to Petrarch’s Laura, the beautiful, golden-
haired, idealized woman immortalized as the love
interest in the fourteenth-century poet’s sonnets
(Rossetti was thoroughly familiar with Petrarch,
incorporating allusions to his poetry within her
own).
 Within nineteenth-century culture, hair had great
symbolic significance and value. Locks of hair
were exchanged as tokens of love and kept as
mementos of the dead. Hair also had material
value, as many destitute women sold their hair to
wigmakers. The act of giving away her precious
hair in exchange for indulging in the sensual
Christina Rossetti's Goblin Market
pleasures of the goblins’ fruit thus aligns Laura
by Winifred Knights
with the figure of the fallen woman.
 Goblin Men’s Fruit
 The goblin men’s fruit is a complex symbol that represents different kinds of
desire and temptation throughout the poem. For Laura specifically, the fruit
represent a desire for things that are forbidden, exotic, and sensual. The
goblins present the fruit to Laura on golden plates and describe it using
sensuous language, emphasizing its taste, color, and juiciness. There is clearly a
sexual dimension to Laura’s desire for the fruit, especially evident in the
descriptions of her eating it: she ―sucked and sucked and sucked the more,‖ and
―sucked until her lips were sore.‖
 Lizzie similarly recognizes the fruit as an object of desire, but she perceives
its dangerous qualities and tries to warn her sister against eating it.
 The Goblin Men
 The goblin men are the mysterious
villains of the poem. Where they come
from is never specified, but each morning
and evening they call out in order to tempt
young women into purchasing and eating
their fruit.
 The goblins seemingly exist only to harm
women; they delight in tricking young
women into eating their fruit and then
abandoning them, causing great misery.
Although they can be sly and persuasive,
the goblins are also vicious and brutal: they
savagely attack Lizzie in a way that
resembles a sexual assault when she
refuses to eat their fruit. The goblins are
thus symbols of temptation and the
Goblin Fruit dangerous sexual appetites of men, and
Marchants their behavior reflects societal fears
about how women become ―fallen.‖
Themes
 Temptation and Fallen Women
 ―Goblin Market‖ is a complex poetic allegory
about sexual temptation. Writing in the mid-
nineteenth century, at a time of strict societal
expectations regarding women’s behavior,
Christina Rossetti was intensely interested in
the plight of fallen women—those women
who, by society’s standards, were perceived to
have given in to the temptation of engaging in
sex outside of marriage and who were
subsequently shunned.
 Rossetti allows Laura to avoid the typical
fates for fallen women in nineteenth-century
literature, however, which are death, exile, or
transportation to the colonies. In doing so,
Rossetti seems to suggest that fallenness is only
a temporary state rather than a stain that remains
on a woman for the rest of her life and that
complete rehabilitation and reintegration into her
community remains possible. Laura’s
rehabilitation is made possible by her sister,
Lizzie.
 Role of the Women in the Victorian Society
 In ―Goblin Market,‖ Rossetti reflects on the role of women in Victorian
society. The poem critiques the unfairness of society’s double standards,
showing how they put women at a disadvantage, and then challenges
them by allowing Laura to achieve a happy ending despite her
transgression. However, both Lizzie and Laura’s ultimate redemption
involves a return to motherly duties and caring for the next generation of
girls. Rossetti, then, ultimately upholds a distinctly gendered view of
society in which women occupy and find fulfillment within very specific
domestic roles.
 Another theme lurking in ―Goblin Market‖ is that of motherhood and
familial roles, the first of which is mentioned at the end when Lizzie and
Laura are both happy and healthy once again and have become mothers. The
familial role of the sisters is carried out through the projected relationships
of Lizzie and Laura, and the role of the ministering mother is depicted
through Laura and Lizzie at the end of ―Goblin Market‖. Their husbands are
never mentioned, even though the end of the poem describes how Lizzie and
Laura both have children of their own and are now warning them about
the dangers of the goblin men and their tempting fruit.
 Salvation and Sacrifice
 Rossetti uses biblical allusions to align Lizzie with
Christ, whose sacrifice saves humanity from death, a
radical decision given that Victorian society did not
treat men and women as equals. Perhaps more
radically still, Rossetti seems to suggest that the plight
of fallen women might call out the nobler qualities—
like bravery and self-sacrifice—in their unfallen
sisters, calling them to become more like Christ.
 Contrary to the dominant beliefs of her time, Rossetti
seems to suggest that braving danger in order to
help fallen women (who were often vilified by
society) is what makes a woman Christlike, not
maintaining sexual purity by avoiding danger
altogether. Through Lizzie’s act of self-sacrifice, Laura
is saved from Jeanie’s fate, and Lizzie, herself, grows
in strength and understanding.
 In overcoming her fear, Lizzie sets an example for
the young women of the next generation—including
Lizzie’s and Laura’s own daughters—of the way
that women should care for one another, ―For there
is no friend like a sister.‖
 Important Questions from the Text
10 Marks Questions:
1. Title of the Poem
2. Contrast the character of Laura and Lizzie
3. Condition of Victorian Women in the society as
portrayed in the poem
4. Goblin Market as a text of Lesbian-erotic fantasy.
5. Symbols used in the poem.
5 Marks Questions:
1. Significance of Golden hair
2. Figure of Goblins
3. Theme of Salvation and Sacrifice
4. Symbol of fruits as used in the poem
Thank You!