36 Poetry for Students
Her appreciation for nature, one aspect of this
sense, is clear in the first stanza. In the second
stanza the poet moves into the realm of artifacts,
or human-made things. She describes ornate works
of decorative art. The dais, or platform, seems de-
signed for a queen, with its “silk,” “purple dyes,”
and “fleurs-de-lys.” Both the color purple and the
fleurs-de-lys are traditional symbols of royalty.
Much of the design, while artificial, is derived from
nature. The speaker asks for representations of
“doves,” “pomegranates,” and peacocks” to be
carved into the dais, and for “gold and silver”
“grapes” and “leaves” to be included. The natural
objects are transformed into fanciful, elaborate
works of art.
In these aesthetics, Rossetti shows what she
shares with ideas of the Pre-Raphaelite Brother-
hood (PRB), a movement of artists and poets that
was founded by her brother, Dante Gabriel Ros-
setti. Members of the PRB promoted ideal repre-
sentations of nature, often in a fantastic, dreamlike
manner. Since Rosetti moves in “A Birthday” to
the description of works of art in order to better ex-
press the speaker’s feelings about love, we may as-
sume that she gave the artistic a higher status than
the natural. However, she makes it clear that the
art has its basis in nature.
Rossetti’s aesthetic sense includes her appre-
ciation for the music of lyric poetry. The poem has
a regular meter, or rhythm of lines, and a consis-
tent rhyme scheme. She uses ordinary language,
though she creates extraordinary pictures with it.
“A Birthday” is an ideal lyric poem: it is song-like
and it expresses the speaker’s feelings.Metrics/Prosody
“A Birthday” is written in two octaves, or stan-
zas of eight lines each. Rhetorically, the octaves
parallel one another, each attempting to construct
a way to express the speaker’s love and each reach-
ing a climax in the final two lines. By dividing the
lines of the first stanza into feet, or units of rhythm,
we can see that they are written in iambic tetram-
eter. This means that each line consists of four
iambs, or two-syllable segments in which the first
syllable is unstressed and the second is stressed. As
an example of iambic tetrameter, consider the fol-
lowing line from the first stanza:
My heart is like a singing bird
If we divide the four iambs from one another
and mark the unstressed and stressed syllables, the
line appears like this:
Myheart / islike / a sing / ing bird.The strongly accentuated syllables in each
iamb give a rapid pace to the line and to the stanza,
imitating the ecstatic energy of the speaker.Historical Context.
Economy
Christina Rossetti’s life (1830-1894) closely
coincides with the reign of Queen Victoria (from
1837 to 1901). The British Empire was at its height
during this period: Britain’s navy dominated the
seas, enabling the country to expand its holdings
around the globe, and the Industrial Revolution was
well-advanced, making England the world leader
in manufacturing and trade.
However, there were problems that accompa-
nied this military power and economic success.
Factory workers toiled long hours for little pay; and
there were a million and a half people living in
poverty at mid-century. Laissez-faireeconomics,
which means no government intervention in the
economy, was the prevailing policy, and it seemed
to doom much of the population to dire circum-
stances.
Much of the blame for economic problems was
placed on the rapidly growing middle class. This
group included small businessmen and shopkeep-
ers, but it also encompassed factory owners,
bankers, and entrepreneurs. The high status of busi-
ness interests and the predominance of materialism
seemed to define the economic situation.
In response to a wide gap between the poor
and those of moderate means, many people fought
for reform during the Victorian Era. There were
movements to allow more people the right to vote
and to protect workers and children. Furthermore,
some English citizens did not favor their country’s
overseas expansion, and they supported home rule
for Ireland and attempts by India to win indepen-
dence from Great Britain. Many Victorian writers
and artists denounced the materialism of the busi-
ness-oriented Empire.
As a writer and a member of the middle class,
Rossetti was affected by the events of her day. In
one of her poems, “Counterblast on Penny Trum-
pet,” she praises a government minister who re-
signed his post in protest over a British attack on
Egypt. Rossetti was opposed to war and violence;
she volunteered as a social worker to help prosti-
tutes and unmarried mothers; and she supported a
movement to prevent child prostitution. AfterA Birthday