Let’s Read and Understand a Poem: “In An Artist’s Studio” by Christina Rossetti

Hello. I'm Gill at engVid, and today we're going to look at a poem. I've had a lot of

requests for more poems, so here we are. And this one is called "In an Artist's Studio",

and it's by a woman poet called Christina Rossetti, and these are her dates, 1830 to

1894. And she was based in London, she lived in London, and so you would call her a Victorian

poet because she lived in the reign of Queen Victoria in this country, so that's Victorian.

And she also was part of a group of people - well, not her specifically, but her two

brothers were part of a group of artists called the Pre-Raphaelites, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood,

so brotherhood tells you they were all men. But she was connected through her family,

so she is sort of thought of as part of the Pre-Raphaelite movement in a sense. So they

were painters mainly, but some of them were also poets. And her brother Dante Gabriele

Rossetti was a poet and a painter. So it's interesting that here she's writing about

an artist, and you might wonder is she referring to her own brother? We don't really know for

sure, but it's an interesting thought. So, well, let's have a look at it as a poem and

just to see what it's all about. Also, to look at some of the poetic features, like

the rhyming, okay, and the choice of words, things like that.

So, I've just written up the first four lines. It's 14 lines in total, which means that it's

a sonnet. You've probably seen me mention this word before. If you've seen some of my

other poetry videos, I've looked at some sonnets before. So, a sonnet is usually 14 lines long.

Okay. Right, so let's have a look. So, "One face looks out from all his canvases. One self

same figure sits or walks or leans. We found her hidden just behind those screens. That

mirror gave back all her loveliness." Okay. So, this is the first four lines, and sonnets

often do get divided up into sections like this, so it's quite usual for the first four

lines to be one section that belongs together, and you can see it's all one long sentence

from the punctuation. There's a full stop here. There's a comma and another comma and

a colon there, so this is all one sentence. And also, we can look at the rhyme scheme

while we're here. So, we've got "canvases", "leans", "screens", "loveliness". So, "canvases",

"loveliness" are just about a rhyme, so "a" and "a", and then "leans" and "screens" are

a different rhyme, so we have "b" and "b" there, so you would say it's "abba" is the

first group of rhymes, and that rhyming helps to hold those four lines together. Okay. So,

but let's have a look at what she's actually saying. So, there's a face in all of the artist's

canvases, so the canvas is the surface that the artist paints on, usually with oil paints

if it's a canvas. Okay. So, one face, you see the same face, one self-same figure, a

face and a figure, the full body sometimes, sits or walks or leans, sort of leaning like

this. And it's... She's female. We found her hidden just behind those screens. So, in the

artist's studio, there are probably some screens, and behind the screens, we, whoever we are,

we found these paintings hidden behind the screens, and this figure, the same model,

this is a model that the artist has been painting over and over again, we found her hidden.

And that mirror gave back. She was reflected in a mirror. It's either a mirror inside the

painting itself, or there could have been a mirror in the studio, and they saw one of

the paintings reflected in the mirror. It's difficult to know where the mirror is. Is

it painted in a picture, or was it an actual mirror physically in the studio? That mirror

gave back, reflected all her loveliness. So, there's this lovely female model who is appearing

in so many of this artist's paintings on his canvases. Okay. So, it's rather intriguing.

So, we'll now move on to the next four lines.

Okay, so now we have the next few lines, and also just to mention that when you have a

section of four lines like this, it's called a quatrain. Okay. A quatrain, which just means

four lines, really. "Quatre" in French means four, so that's what it is. Quatrain. So,

here's the second quatrain. Okay? So, I'll just read it. So, continuing on about the

model who appears in the paintings, this is how she appears. "A queen in opal or in ruby

dress. A nameless girl in freshest summer greens. A saint, an angel. Every canvas means

the same one meaning, neither more or less." So, this female figure appears, same face

every time. Sometimes she's dressed like a queen in different coloured dresses. Sometimes

just as a girl in a green dress in the summer, or she could be a saint or an angel, but it's

her every time, same person every time. "Every canvas means the same one meaning, neither

more or less. It's her each time." Okay. So, it feels sort of mysterious that these people,

we found her hidden. It seems a bit of a mystery. Who is this girl?

So, and let's have a look at the rhyme scheme again. So, dress greens means less. So, canvases,

loveliness, dress. So, that's really the A rhyme again. Dress and less. Okay. And then

we have greens and means, leans and screens. So, that's the B rhyme again. Okay? So, as

I said, these... This rhyme scheme holds those sections together like that. And then, so

you've got two quatrains, and then that adds up to eight, of course, and that's called

an octave. So, octave. So, that's eight. That's... In a... In a sonnet, you get really often

eight plus six, so there are six more lines to come. This is a Petrarchan sonnet when

it's eight and six, because the poet Petrarch, Italian poet, wrote sonnets with this kind

of structure. Shakespeare, when he wrote sonnets, he used a slightly different structure, so

they're called Shakespearean sonnets, but this is the Petrarchan structure here.

Okay, so we have this mysterious model appearing in lots of different paintings, in different

costumes each time, in different colours. A queen, a girl, a saint, an angel, so mysterious.

Who is she? So, let's see if the next part of the poem answers that question.

Okay, so here we have the final six lines, and this is called the sestet. Okay? Sestet.

So, we have quatrain, quatrain, and sestet, also octave. So, eight plus six gives the

full 14 lines of the sonnet. Okay. So, let's have a look and see what happens in this final

section of the poem.

So, he, meaning the artist, he feeds upon her face by day and night. So, that sounds

a little bit... A bit strange. He feeds upon her face. It sounds a bit unnatural, a bit

obsessive perhaps, if he... If he, the artist, is sort of gazing at her face, looking day

and night, obsessed with how she looks, perhaps. And she, with true, kind eyes, looks back

on him. So, that sounds a bit more natural. "True, kind eyes", that looks as if she, as

the model, looks back at him as she's modelling for him. "True, kind eyes", she sounds quite

a straightforward person, but whereas he sounds a bit obsessive perhaps. So, she looks back

at him, back on him. "Fair as the moon and joyful as the light". So, she's fair, meaning

beautiful as the moon. Well, the moon is often associated with women. The moon is regarded

as female, and the sun is regarded as male in a lot of poetry. So, it's appropriate for

her to be compared to the moon because the moon is often thought of as female and related

to women. Okay. So, she's fair as the moon and joyful as the light. So, she looks happy

in the pictures. "Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim." So, she's... The poet is

saying what she doesn't look like, which is a bit strange. Why would she mention this

at all? To be... "wan" meaning "pale". So, again, you'd think the moon is pale compared

to the sun. The moon is a lesser light compared to the brightness of the sun. But we've got

the moon and the light, but now "wan" meaning "pale with waiting". So, what would she be

waiting for? "Not with sorrow dim". Again, dim meaning not a lot of light. So, why would

the poet mention this if the model doesn't look like that? It makes you wonder. Did she...

Does the poet know the real woman who did the modelling? Does she know more than, you

know, more than we can see in the paintings? Does she know the reality of that model and

her life? Has she been pale and one with waiting? And has she been dim with sorrow? Has she

been unhappy? This is part of the mystery still. And who... Would it be the artist that

she's waiting for? What was the relationship between the model and the artist? Interesting.

Was she unhappy about something? Okay. "Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright."

So it's almost as if the poet knows this woman as she is now, and she may be pale with waiting

and dim with sorrow now, but at this time, maybe years ago in the paintings, she looks

much happier. So, what's happened? Something's happened to that woman, that mysterious woman.

Because as she is now, she may be pale and sorrowful. "Not as she is now, but was as

she was when hope shone bright." So in the paintings, maybe a few years back, that's

when hope shone bright, when she was happy and hopeful and had a good feeling about the

future. "Not as she is", that's repeated again. "Not as she is now, but as she fills his dream."

Ooh. So, this is the final line of the poem. So, his dream, that's the artist again. He

dreams about her, but is that sort of some imaginative... Imagina... Imaginary? Is that

some imaginary woman and she's not really like that? Is he imagining her in a way that

it's not really her? He's sort of projecting something onto her. He has a dream and he

interprets her in a certain way, perhaps, but not as she is. What's the reality of this

woman's life compared with the dream that the artist has about her? It's as if something

has gone wrong somewhere if she's now sorrowful and pale with waiting. So interesting. So,

it's all very mysterious, but anyway, let's just do the rhyme scheme to see what the structure

of this is. So, we've got "night", "him", "light", "dim", "bright", "dream". So, "night", that

doesn't rhyme with any lines that have gone before, so we'll have to give that a "c".

Okay. "Night", "light", there's another "c". "Bright", there's another "c". And then "him",

"him" doesn't rhyme with anything that's gone before, so we'll call that "d". "Him" and

"dim", and then "dream", it's almost the same. It's not "drim", it's "dream", but we have

"em", "him", "dim", "dream". So, we've got the "em", but the vowel sound is slightly

different. So, it is "d", but it's what you would call a half rhyme because the consonant

sound is the same, but the vowel sound is different. "Him" and "dim", that's a full

rhyme, but "dream" isn't a full rhyme because the vowel sound is slightly different. "Dream"

rather than "drim", "dream". Which is interesting that, you know, if there is a half rhyme,

it usually has a certain effect, and if the whole poem ends on a half rhyme, it might

leave you with a sense of imperfection or a sense of questioning because it's not a

really definite full rhyme. It leaves you feeling, "Oh, dear. Oh. Ah. Okay." As if the

poem hasn't been completed fully, there's something still not right, and that's the

effect of the poem on, you know, the subject of the poem, too. You're wondering, you know,

"Who is this woman?" And as she is, as she is now, how is she now? Is she pale and unhappy

and without hope? When she used to have hope, has she lost hope now? And she's in his dream,

but what's going on with her actual life, you know? It's very strange.

So, I think a little bit of background biographical information just to end with and for you to

perhaps do a bit of research yourself if you want to find out a bit more. But I can tell

you, as I said earlier, Christina Rossetti's brother, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, was a poet

and an artist. It's possible to see a lot of his pictures reproduced on the internet.

We have a link for you where you can see a lot of his paintings. And obviously artists,

they need models to be able to paint, so you'll be able to see on that link some of his paintings

with female figures in them, and you'll see that there's one particular female model who

appears over and over again. And she was called Elizabeth Siddle, and she began as his student.

He was teaching her painting because she was quite talented as a painter, and she was having

lessons from him, and she did write poetry as well. So, she was having lessons in painting

from Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and she was painting herself. But then they... And then she was

his model too, so she modeled for him. Then they started to have a romantic relationship

together, and eventually they got married. Okay?

In addition to that, Christina, Dante Gabriel Rossetti's sister, also modeled for him in

at least one painting, so you'll be able to see that painting as well on the link. So

she herself knows what it's like to model for an artist and to see the end result. So

that's two people that we know of who modeled for her brother. The question is, you know,

whether this poem is directly about Dante Gabriel Rossetti or whether maybe he just

inspired her, the whole situation with him and Christina and Elizabeth Siddle, artist

and two models, just gave her an idea for a poem, and she may have used her imagination

for part of it. But it is true that Elizabeth Siddle was unhappy at certain times. The relationship

with Dante Gabriel wasn't perfect, and so you can find out more about that if you want

to Google it. It's quite complicated, but I'll let you do your own research on that

to see what you can find out.

Okay, so I think I'll just finish by reading the whole poem through so that you can get

an overview of it. Okay, so here we go in an artist's studio. "One face looks out from

all his canvases. One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans. We found her hidden just

behind those screens. That mirror gave back all her loveliness. A queen in opal or in

ruby dress. A nameless girl in freshest summer greens. A saint, an angel. Every canvas means

the same one meaning, neither more or less. He feeds upon her face by day and night, and

she with true kind eyes looks back on him. Fair as the moon and joyful as the light.

Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim. Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright.

Not as she is, but as she fills his dream."

Okay, so I hope you've enjoyed the poem, and thank you for watching, and see you again

soon. Bye for now.