Harlem Renaissance

Li Sun

Final paper for Harlem Renaissance

Dec. 11th

12th grade

Dark human nature—Goblin Market

Goblin Market is like a delicate painting drawn by Christina Rossetti, this “painting” seems to have a colorful and harmless appearance--varieties of fruit, peddling of men and a limpid stream. However, there are all the dark and ulterior desires underneath the flashy and showy outside. Laura and Lizzie are two innocent sisters with totally opposite characteristics. Laura is the girl who cannot resist the temptation of Goblin men, on the other hand, Lizzie is the girl who always has a level head, always tells Laura not lose herself. In order to understand the poem multi-dimensionally, we can interpret the poem in several perspectives.

Firstly, there are a lot of religious elements in this poem. “They answered all together: Buy from us with a golden curl. She clipped a precious golden lock, she dropped a tear more rare than pearl.” This quote to some extent is similar as the Garden of Eden. Laura is like Eve, and all the Goblin men are like the snake, the evil snake tempted the naïve Laura and wants to take advantages of her, eventually, like Eve, Laura lost her virginity. In addition, the whole thesis matches the whole theme of Christianity---protect your personal purity, resist all the lures from the world. Another analysis, Goblins are like the Demon Satan, Lizzie is like Jesus, Satan tried different ways to tempt Jesus, he provided food when Jesus is hungry, he promised Jesus all the power and money. Jesus was never vacillant. Finally, Satan gave up, and escaped dejectedly and Goblins eventually gave up seducing Lizzie. All the narratives in the poem are like several biblical stories, these stories closely linked with each other and offer us a poem with black and white, evil and kindness.

The second perspective is Feminist. As a female poet, Rossetti’s poem definitely has a numbers of unique female writings. Lizzie and Laura are both female, when Laura...