"O Wanton Eyes Run Over: Repetition and Fantasy in Christina Rossetti

Abstract

How do we reconcile the Christina Rossetti of Goblin Market with the Christina Rossetti of "The Lowest Place"? In order to explore the extraordinary conflict between religion and sexuality Rossetti's poetry expresses, this paper will read Rossetti through the writings of Jacques Lacan. Psychoanalytic interpretations of poets like Christina Rossetti have become unfashionable in a critical milieu that prefers to emphasize the self-reflexive, ironic, and parodic possibilities in Rossetti's writing. Such readings explicitly or implicitly rely on the image of Victorian poetry presented by Isobel Armstrong, who sees it