The Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti is the ideal fairy tale. It is full of sexual references and there is even a moral at the end. It fits all the criteria for a Disney film. The poem even has heroes, two sisters, and various villains, the goblins. However don’t be looking for a knight in shining amour to ride the girls into the sunset because there are no male characters throughout the poem.
The first stanza is filled not only with sexual references but also with a reference to the sisters’ innocence, as the goblins tempt the girls to buy their fruits.
“ Come buy, come buy
Apples and quinces
Lemons and oranges
Plump and unpecked cherries
Melons and raspberries,
Bloom-down-checked peaches,
Swart-headed mulberries
Wild free-born cranberries…..”
Alex, oh Alex. How I love your word choice--"if you suckle the fruits of the goblins..."
ReplyDeleteAnyway.
It's interesting how you say the ending is "semi-forced." I think that it ends the way we are expected to suppose it ends, if that makes sense. Thus I don't really agree that this is a fairy tale at its finest. I find "Goblin Market" (like the majority of the texts we've read thus far) to have a dark and sinister underbelly. Though, yes, the sisters lose their innocence and go through a transformation, I do not think the conclusion is at all a happy, fairy tale ending.
While I do agree with Hannah in saying that Rosetti's poem contains "a dark, sinister underbelly," I also feel that the ending of "The Goblin Market" can be interpreted as a traditional happily ever after. However, it's important to note that the term "fairy tale" may have several different connotations, as the original Brother's Grimm fairy tales are much different from the sugar-coated technicolor Disney versions. Though today more people may think of Disney before the Brother's Grimm when the words "fairy tale" are mentioned, Rosetti's poem was obviously written before Disney was around.
ReplyDeleteIt is in my opinion that "The Goblin Market" is somewhere in between the aptly-named Grimm fairy tales and the sickeningly sweet Disney tales. I interpret the ending of "The Goblin Market" to be an uplifting one. Though the story itself depicts a horrendous struggle against temptation and illustrates the fall of one of the characters, the ending instills hope by suggesting that even after someone has fallen to temptation (perhaps drugs, sex, or other wicked conventions of the world), it is possible to recover and live a happy life. In "The Goblin Market," Lizzie saves her fallen sister, Laura who has suckled the fruits of the goblins despite warning and seems to be deteriorating because of it. At the end of the day, sisterly love conquers all, and Lizzie and Laura go on to marry, have children, and tell their cautionary tale.
Though none of the characters in Rosetti's poem go to such extreme lengths as mutilating their feet, like in the Brother's Grimm's version of Cinderella, I still wouldn't characterize the poem as Disney-esque because of the sexual imagery (i.e. "she sucked until her lips were sore") and the disturbing withdrawal-like symptoms that Laura experiences once she is unable to eat the goblins' fruit after the first time she tastes it.
Alex, I don’t mean to pick, or anything like that, but could rape really be a temptation in a women’s life? I don’t think that many women are tempted by the idea of rape. Instead, I think rape, at least for Christina Rossetti, is a consequence for the belief that men could do anything they wanted to women, because they were not free. Maybe the better choice would be given into sexual acts, or even sex at that. Laura was not raped, by them as she offered herself to the goblin for the price of a lock of her golden hair. Laura was well aware of what she was doing, as she had known the consequences for giving in to the goblin men, because of the character Jeanie. (It was Lizzie who was “raped” as her form of payment was not accepted, and the goblin attempted to drench her in their juices..)
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, I do agree with the fact that this poem is about an addiction, that can be overcome with the help of a friend. This becomes a direct relation to the life that Christina herself lived, as she was willing to help women who had fallen into a life of addiction and of promiscuity.