Last week I shared an account of Burne-Jones and Rossetti and their fascination with that delightful creature, the wombat. Today I share another contemporary account of Rossetti and his strange collection of animals.  Alas, no mention of the beloved wombat, but it is an interesting account of Rossetti and his menagerie. 
From The Story of My Life by Dame Ellen Terry:

“Miss Herbert was not a remarkable actress, but her appearance was wonderful indeed. She was very tall, with pale gold hair and the spiritual, ethereal look which the aesthetic movement loved. When mother wanted to flatter me very highly, she said that I looked like Miss Herbert! Rossetti founded many of his pictures on her, and she and Mrs. “Janie” Morris were his favorite types. When any one was the object of Rossetti’s devotion, there was no extravagant length to which he would not go in demonstrating it. He bought a white bull because it had “eyes like Janie Morris,” and tethered it on the lawn of his home in Chelsea. Soon there was no lawn left—only the bull! He invited people to meet it, and heaped favors on it until it kicked everything to pieces, when he reluctantly got rid of it.

His next purchase was a white peacock, which, very soon after its arrival, disappeared under the sofa. In vain did Rossetti “shoo” it out. It refused to budge. This went on for days.

“The lovely creature won’t respond to me,” said Rossetti pathetically to a friend.

The friend dragged out the bird.

“No wonder! It’s dead!”

“Bulls don’t like me,” said Rossetti a few days later, “and peacocks aren’t homely.”

It preyed on his mind so much that he tried to repair the failure by buying some white dormice. He sat them up on tiny bamboo chairs, and they looked sweet. When the winter was over, he invited a party to meet them and congratulate them upon waking up from their long sleep.

“They are awake now,” he said, “but how quiet they are! How full of repose!”

One of the guests went to inspect the dormice more closely, and a peculiar expression came over his face. It might almost have been thought that he was holding his nose.

“Wake up, little dormice,” said Rossetti, prodding them gently with a quill pen.

“They’ll never do that,” said the guest. “They’re dead. I believe they have been dead some days!”

Do you think Rossetti gave up live stock after this? Not a bit of it. He tried armadillos and tortoises.

“How are the tortoises?” he asked his man one day, after a long spell of forgetfulness that he had any.

“Pretty well, sir, thank you…. That’s to say, sir, there ain’t no tortoises!”

The tortoises, bought to eat the beetles, had been eaten themselves. At least, the shells were found full of beetles.

And the armadillos? “The air of Chelsea don’t suit them,” said Rossetti’s servant. They had certainly left Rossetti’s house, but they had not left Chelsea. All the neighbors had dozens of them! They had burrowed, and came up smiling in houses where they were far from welcome.”–text via Project Gutenberg

Happy Wombat Friday!  With brownies!

Georgiana Burne-Jones writes about Rossetti’s interest in wombats in Memorials of Burne-Jones, vol. I:

“Mr. Prinsep says that the windows in the spaces they were painting were whitened in order to tone the light, and that the whitened glass was covered all over with sketches, chiefly of wombats.  ”Do you know the wombat at the zoo?” asked Rossetti; “a delightful creature–the most comical little beast.”  He was drawn by Edward in endless different positions and situations, and Rossetti’s admiration led him years afterwards to buy a live one and try to make it happy at Cheyne Walk”

By the way, would you like my brownie recipe?  I wish that I could say that these are Pre-Raphaelite brownies, a recipe handed down within the Millais or Rossetti family.  But, alas, no. I’m pretty sure that brownies are American and I just happen to love them.

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 cup white sugar

1 tsp. vanilla extract

2 eggs

1/2 cup flour

1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (I use Hershey’s)

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

Mix sugar, oil and vanilla well.  Then beat in your two eggs.  In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt, and cocoa powder (I sort of eyeball the cocoa powder, so sometimes I may have more than 1/3 cup. Huzzah!  More cocoa!). Now stir into your oil-sugar-eggs mixture.

Pour into a greased pan (I usually use a rectangular pan, although sometimes I use a cupcake pan).  After pouring, lick the spoon well.  This is non-optional for me.

Bake 20 minutes at 350 degrees.

Memorials of Burne-Jones, Vol. I, p. 149

Today I have been contemplating this passage from The Memorials of Burne-Jones:

“All the actual study of painting that Edward did with Rossetti was a few mornings’ work in his studio, but what he learnt from him was far more than painting. “He taught me to have no fear or shame of my own ideas, to design perpetually, to seek no popularity, to be altogether myself — and this in not any words I can remember, but in the tenor of his conversation always and in the spirit of everything he said. I remember that he discouraged me from study of the antique–the classical antique– giving as his reason that such study came too early in a man’s life and was apt to crush out his individuality; adding that when a man had once found his own and was much older and could front the fear of being crushed, a year or so given to much study would be an excellent thing.  So what I chiefly gained from him was not to be afraid of myself, but to do the thing that I liked most: but in those first years I never wanted to think but as he thought, and all he did and said fitted me through and through.  He never harangued or persuaded, but had a gift of saying things authoritatively and not as the Scribes, such as I had never heard in any man. ” (bold emphasis mine)

Burne-Jones’ caricature of himself in the studio at Red Lion Square

I received a package this week that was so lovely, I had to incorporate it into Wombat Friday. Thank you to Jo Secondo for sending me a vintage copy of The Macdonald Sisters, beautifully wrapped in William Morris paper and with a Rossetti card!

Most of my favorite Rossetti paintings incorporate vivid green hues, such as Proserpine and The Day-Dream.  However, I find myself drawn to the lighter color scheme of Roman Widow.  It’s so bright and airy– not what we would consider mournful, except that’s my own modern perception.  Rossetti’s painting is historically accurate since the Romans wore white robes for mourning.  I believe that Buddhist and Asian cultures also wear white as mourning, as well as people in medieval Europe.  (Here’s an interesting post about historical funeral fashion conventions.)

Alexa Wilding served as the model for Roman Widow.  Her fingers seem to lightly strum the instrument in the same absentminded fashion as in Veronica Veronese:

Yet again, I think that Rossetti is using his gauzy scarf (as mentioned in Favorite Fashion Details):

Scarf used as headdress in ‘Roman Widow’

Scarf seen in this detail from ‘The Bower Meadow’. Also, note Rossetti’s oft-used spiral hair pin.

Scarf seen again in this detail from ‘The Blessed Damozel’.

Detail from ‘La Ghirlandata’

I wonder if it is the same scarf or shawl visible in this 1865 of Jane Morris.  I desperately want it to be the same one. Mainly because when I look at the photo, it is the blurred movement of the scarf that speaks to me.  It seems so alive, so ephemeral.

Thank you to Alexandrion Drallipo for discovering these images.  William Morris’ Larkspur wallpaper in Finding Neverland:

William Morris’ Willow pattern wallpaper in the TV series Justified:

William Morris Windrush wallpaper in Django Unchained:

Thank you to Lisa Gill for noticing The Crystal Ball by John William Waterhouse in The Following:

It has been a difficult week. So many troubling stories in the news. The Pre-Raphaelites had it right when they sought to include nature in their works, for today this simple, cheerful flower has boosted my mood. Happy Wombat Friday! “Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty if only we have the eyes to see them.” (John Ruskin)

And now for the winner!

Thank you so much for participating in my first giveaway.  It was so fun reading your comments that I feel another giveaway coming on soon!  I chose the winning comment using www.random.org/integers/ to generate a number at random.  Congratulations to Lindsey Marton, I shall send you an email right away!

It’s my first giveaway!  And what a giveaway it is!  One lucky reader will receive these three gorgeous blank journals.  Designed by Brigid Ashwood, each journal is a 6X9 paperback with 200 pages.  Pages are lined on one side, blank on the other. Journals are available for purchase here.

To enter, simply post a comment below.  It doesn’t have to be elaborate, a nice “I want these journals!” or “I like your blog” will do. The winner will be chosen at random on Friday.  Good luck, I know you are going to love these!

Happy Easter!  Pictured in the background is Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s ‘The Girlhood of Mary Virgin‘, Rossetti’s first oil painting and the first work to bear the inscription ‘PRB’.  His models for this work were his mother, Frances Polidori Rossetti, and sister Christina.

For new readers, here’s an explanation of Wombat Friday and don’t miss this post at The Kissed Mouth (Kirsty explained Rossetti and his wombat much better than I did).

Wherever you are, you may or may not be experiencing spring weather yet.  Even if you’re not, we can still enjoy an allegorical representation of Spring, here’s Spring by Sir Edward Burne-Jones:

Pan and Psyche, Edward Burne-Jones

Burne-Jones painted this version of Pan and Psyche after his lover, Mary Zambaco, attempted to throw herself in Regent’s Canal in an ugly and embarrassing scene.  It was the breaking point of an illicit relationship that was painful for all involved.  Burne-Jones had intense feelings for Mary but could not bring himself to abandon his children or his wife Georgie.  Mary had grown increasingly desperate and, upon the realization that he would not leave his family, presented Ned with a sufficient amount of Laudanum to kill them both.  In response to his shocked refusal, she ran to the river and he was forced to wrestle her to the ground.

It is an ugly thing to write about.  Even though over a hundred years have passed, I feel uncomfortable blogging about something so personal and painful.  Yet, it is interesting to see how Burne-Jones depicted Mary after their affair ended.

He casts her as Phyllis in Phyllis and Demophoon.  Phyllis committed suicide by hanging when her lover Demophoon left her.

Perhaps even more telling is his choice to portray her as Nimue as she entraps Merlin in The Beguiling of Merlin.  Through his work, Burne-Jones tells us an autobiographical tale of his own beguiling and his entrapment because of their affair.  In Merlin’s face, we see the artist’s own features. Perhaps The Beguiling of Merlin was a way of marking the end of the drama.   He was disillusioned, even writing that she was “A woman at her best, self-denying and devoted , is pathetic and lovely beyond words; but once she gets the upper hand and flaunts, she’s the devil.”

Of course, you can also see Mary in happier works, before the bitterness set in.  My favorites are the Pygmalion series.