DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.

Otago Witness, Issue 1832, 31 December 1886, Page 15

DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.

(Written for the Witness, by J. S. B.) The intrinsic worth of an author's work

cannot be rightly appraised by his contemporaries, and it is possible that the fate that has befallen so many' others may overtake Rossetti, and posterity reverse the judgment of his. own. generation.. However this may be, it is certain that the present measure of success achieved by, him as poet, painter, and artistic reformer, is such as very few have lived to enjoy. It is altogether beyond the province of this paper to attempt an estimate of the vahie of Rossetti's literary work, but to glacce at the motives and methods of the master-workman of, the. enthusiastic band who, from so modest "a 1 beginning, exalted their dootrines to_ such- honourable prominence, and illustrated their foreceps so admirably. . . - It is essential, at the outset, that we should fix in our minds a clear impression of the principles maintained by the so-called "Pre-raphaelite brotherhood" in its more advanced stage, after the tacit renunciation of dogmas involving merely mechanical imitation and indiscriminate exactness of detail, to the almost complete exclusion- of art. All sorts of quaint, and often absurd, theories have been assigned, to the movement. The truth is, it was 1 simply "a return to nature. In the words of one of the original members their aim was : " Plainly to think, even a little thought, and to express in natural words which are native to the Speaker ; to paint even an insignificant object as it is, and not as the old masters, or the new masters have said 'it should be painted; to persevere in' looking- at truth' and at nature without the smallest prejudice for tradition. To draw a cloud of a' flower so that it should be a portrait of that cloud or flower." Their creed was : " The love of beauty for its own sake, the love of passion, colour, and sweet sound." They called themselves " Preraphaelite," because they found in the wings of Sippi's angels, and the columbines of .Penigino's gardens,- that loving and exact study of minute things which gave to them a sense of sinoerity, which they missed in the breadth and ease of -later work.

- Much of the immediate success of the movement is undoubtedly attributable to what Mill so aptly terms "the prestige of extraordinary .qualities' .in its founder "—a condition almost, essential to the contemporaneous success' of any reform, whether religious, political, ,or artistic. The aspirations of the brotherhood, were moulded by Rossetti,- whose influence . over the brilliant and vigorous minds who composed it cannot easily be overstated. . He possessed in an extraordinary degree the faculty for inspiring others, and has been fitly described as "the -centre and sun of a galaxy of talent in poetiy and painting, more brilliant perhaps than any which has ever acknowledged the beneficent sway of any one Englishman of genius." The first fruits of William Morris and Swinburne were dedicated' to the teacher whose work_was not given to' the world until most of.h'iß<p'upils had achieved success and fame, although much of it was known to a chosen few before he had attained his three and ..twentieth year; while the most eminent •,painters of our generation have gratefully recorded their obligations to him. • Although, as yet, we can only speculate • whether English renascent art will permanently retain the- impress so clearly • ; stamped upon it by the Pre-raphaelite school, ,ii needs no critical contemporaneous poetry 'or painting to discern the effects wrought 'by their precepts and example. Pan is dead. . The ideal of the highest'living exponents of ' English art is that created by Keats, and ; Bought after so earnestly by Rossetti and his - followers. The fashion forfacile abstraction ,is passing away. The imagination soars as . high and the diction is as graceful and •sonorous in the work of those who have • thrown off the trammels of tradition and J Greece, as in any in ouf literature. Even Shelley's strong-winged muse never rose to ' oftier regions than the purified ether stirred :by > The soft subsidence of 'the spirit's wing, Then, when she feels, in cloiid-girb wayfaring, < The press of kindred plumes about her feet. In the matchless sonnets comprised in " The •• House of Life " the sonorous music rivals the •f-natural harmonies of Italian or Greek.

It has been said that some paintings of Rossetti's "hung with specimens of other ori>, aaotent oT"iuoderi, simply destroy them

— kill them as the electric light puts out' a glow-worm. No other man's colour will bear those points of ruby crimson, those expanses of deep turquoise blue, those flagrant scarlets and thunderous purples." And so it is with " The song of the Bower" and other poems of that class ; they are absolutely incomparable for a certain kind of metrical and musical beauty, a kind all Rossetti's own. Other poemß may be better or worse, judged by the ordinary canons of critical art, but it would be very difficult to find any composition in the language capable of producing as intense an impression as the poems I have referred to. Ido not mean to assert that Rossetti's poetry transcends any other English poetry, but simply that it possesses some subtle quality, which enables it to create an impression very rarely experienced; we find the same quality occasionally in the poems of others whearenot generally included in the first flight of poets — for instance, Poe's " Sigeia," whose mystic loveliness creates an effect so startling. If the word had not been so degraded by the " nincompoops " whom the facile pencil of Dv Mauvier impales so mercilessly. I should say that " intensity "is the chief characteristic of Rossetti's poetry. In order to fathom the deeper depths of a poet's soul, we should know somewhat of his life and temperament. For the few to whom

THE STORY OF ROSSBTTI'S LIFE is not familiar, it will be sufficient for the purpose in view to give the barest outline. Born in London of Italian parents, his father, Gabriel Rossetti, a political refugee, and widely known as a poet and commentator of Dante ; inhaling an atmosphere of art and poetry almost with his first breath ; a mind active enough to write — in childish fashion, of course — a play in blank verse at five years of age; studious, and apt at learning in a remarkable degree; writing poetry' at fourteen, not wanting in grace and fluency ; deep in the study of middle-age high German poetry for a season, then bracing and maturing his gift of song by close and loving intercourse with early Italian verse, and completing the exquisite series of translations, afterwards published under the title of " Dante and his circle," and achieving such lasting work as' "The Blessed Damozel," which shows no trace of immaturity, at the age of 18 ; acquiring, withal, and as it appears with some difficulty, the technique of that other art in which he was soon to become so famous. Many of his most elaborate designs were executed, arM a great deal of his most enduring poetry was completed before he had attained his three and twentieth year, a record the more remarkable in that his work in writing, painting, or translation is invariably elaborate, profound, and not easily satisfied ; most of his designs were worked out with endless variations, and many of his poems re-written many times. Such, in brief, was the early life of the subject of this sketch. Afterwards came the marriage with the gentle English girl whose Madonna-like beauty inspired all his work for two short happy years, during which she was the lovely and lovable model of almost all his paintings, sometimes in statuesque repose, but oftener employed in the every-day offices of domestic life, as though she moved with such grace that her artist-husband was fain to cry, " stay while I sketch you." Then, alas, the sweet face growing wanner and thinner, and the form drawn, more often now reclining on arm chair or sofa, and at last propped with pillows on the bed from which she never rose. She died within two years from her marriage, and we all know something of the uncontrollable grief of the poet, and how he laid in her coffin the only existing manuscripts of his poems, but few of which had then been published, burying with her not only his love, but all his dreams and hopes of fame. Only after the earnest and importunate solicitations of his warmest friends and most devoted admirers' had been continued for eight years did the poet accord reluctant permission to pluck those immortelles from the grave of her who had been more than life itself to him. And so, in 1870, the world first saw the poems which won immediate fame for their author, who had long since made for himself a place in the foremost rank of painters.

But he had never recovered the shock of his. wife's death, and for long years had been struggling with that most unrelenting of nervous maladies, insomnia ; . and at last, in despair, sough relief in the treacherous drug chloral. Under its baneful influence his magnificent constitution was " slowly but surely undermined, though his intellect stood out until the last; he painted until physical force failed him, and dictated, from the threshold of death, two sonnets which show no sign of weakening vitality of brain. Thus, at the early age of 53, in the very plenitude of his powers, this highlygifted and whole-souled artist passed away. Though all Rossetti's later work is tinged with the sombre hue of an over-mastering and ever present grief, once only in the exquisitely tender poem "The Portrait," are we definitely admitted to the inmost sanctuary of the poet's sorrow :—: — This is her picture as she was : It seems a tiling to wonder on, As though mine image in the glass Should tarry when myself am gone. I gaze until she seems to stir, — Until mine eyes almost aver ' That now, even now, the sweet lips part To breathe the words of the dear heart -. And yet the earth is over her. •

Only this, of love' 6 whole prize, Bemains ; save what in mournful guise Takes counsel with my soul alone. So Was the still movement of her hands, And such the pure linps gracious flow And passing fair the type mu«t seem, Unknown the presence and the dream. 'Tis she: though by herself, alas ! Less than her shadow on the grass, Or than her image on the stream.

When heaven holds breath and hears The beating heart of Love's own breast, — Where round the secret of all spheres All angeli 1 iy their wings to rest,— How shall my sou 1 stand rapt and awed, • When, by the new birth borne abroad Throughout the music of the suns, It enters into hore at onco An' 4 kntfwa the 6iten.ee there fat Gad i

Here with her face doth memory sit Meanwhile, and wait the day's decline, Till other eyes shall look from it, Eyes of the spirit's Palestine. Eve i than the Id gaze tenderer : While homes and aims lon ■ lost with her Stand round her image side by side, Like tombs of pilgrims that have died About the Holy 8 pulchere. In " The Stream's Secret" the same sad chord vibrates. The poet looks back on " The dear heaven so long unknown," and hopefully forward beyond " all the sad sum of vt&y worn days," to a brighter oae, when — Each on the other gazing shall but see A self that has no n-ed to speak ; AH thing* unsought, yet nothing more to seek, One love in unity. • • > • • O, soul-sequestered face Far off, — O were that hour but now ! That I and thou Through thirsting lips should draw love's grace, And in the zone of that su. rerae embrace Bind aching breast and brow. (To be continued.)