Synopses & Reviews
Through theologically-engaged close readings of her poetry and devotional prose, this book explores how Christina Rossetti draws on the Bible and encourages her Victorian readers to respond to its radical message of grace. Structured chronologically, each chapter investigates her participation in the formation of Tractarian theology and details how her interpretative strategies changed over the course of her lifetime. Revealing how her encounter with the biblical text is informed by devotional classics, Christina Rossetti and the Bible highlights the influence of Thomas a' Kempis, John Bunyan, George Herbert and John Donne and describes how Rossetti adapted the teaching of the Ancient and Patristic Fathers and medieval mystics. It also considers the interfaces that are established between her devotional poems and the anthology and periodical pieces alongside which they were published throughout the second half of the nineteenth-century.
About the Author
Elizabeth Ludlow is an independent scholar. Her research specialties include literature and the Bible and nineteenth-century poetry and fiction. She has taught in English Literature departments at the University of Birmingham, UK, the University of Bristol, UK, the University of Warwick, UK, and the University of British Columbia, Canada.
Table of Contents
Introduction: The Place of Waiting \ 1. Attuned to the Voices of the Saints: Christina Rossetti's Devotional Heritage \ 2. Grace, Revelation and Wisdom: Early Poetry including
Goblin Market and Other Poems (1862) \ 3. 'Developing a Theology of Purpose: Poetry of the 1860s and early 1870s including
The Prince's Progress and Other Poems (1866). \ 4. Shaping a Poetics of Affect in
A Pageant and Other Poems (1881) \ 5. Maternity and Vocation: The Devotional Prose (1874- 1892) \ 6. Continuing to Wait: Shaping the Self through
Verses (1893) \ Bibliography \ Index.