Melons

[Jonathan Lighter]

Let me put it this way.  "Goblin Market" is so um-weird that
thirty-five years ago _Playboy_ published it unedited as erotica.  The
specially-commissioned illustrations by Kinuko Craft were equally um-weird,
as I recall.

I don't know whether that was the first public assertion of the um-weird
 interpretation of the poem.  It has, however, become arguably the dominant
reading.

Was Rossetti so oblivious to the implications of her imagery that she
unwittingly produced a nearly flawless Freudian document?  Seems impossible.

Or was she a daring dyke a century ahead of her time, subtly ridiculing the
naivete of her Victorian readers ?  Seems impossible.

Or was it all a perfectly innocent creepy fanatsy for tots and we are the
um-weird?  Seems impossible.

JL

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 2:13 AM, David Bowie <db.list at pmpkn.net> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       David Bowie <db.list at PMPKN.NET>
> Organization: Organized? Me?!
> Subject:      Re: Melons
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> From:    Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>
> > If you think there might be "dual meaning" there, I recommend Christina
> > Rosetti's "Goblin Market" (1859-62)
>
> > http://www.loudlit.org/audio/goblin/pages/01_01_goblin.htm
>
> > Go wild!
>
> This, actually, is the text the student is working with.
>
> I have to admit to a bit of skepticism, because it relies on a
> to-my-mind iffy sort of lit-crit. (The idea is that it starts out with
> the character fantasizing about a man but it going nowhere, then
> switching to a woman in terms of melons and it working for her. To be
> quite honest, i just don't see it.)
>
> The idea has been batted about for a while in lit-crit approaches to
> Goblin Market, apparently, and the student wanted to see if there might
> actually be anything to it. (He hopes there is, FWIW.)
>
> --
> David Bowie                                  http://www.pmpkn.net/lx/
>    Jeanne's Two Laws of Chocolate: If there is no chocolate in the
>    house, there is too little; some must be purchased. If there is
>    chocolate in the house, there is too much; it must be consumed.
>
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