Rossetti Archive Editorial Annotations

Hand and Soul

Basis text: Paragraph numbering scheme for annotations keyed to 1869 Privately Issued Pamphlet.

Textual Notes:

  The workmen: The Germ and The Crayon read: The keen, grave workmen

  in rivals of the soul a: The Germ and The Crayon read: rivals of the soil with

  labours: corrected from “crucifixes and addolorate” in the A Proofs

  Pitti: missing in both The Germ and The Crayon

  almost for himself: corrected from “almost, as it were, for himself” in A Proofs

  lodging: lodgings (in The Crayon )

  he had heard: he heard (in The Fortnightly )

  some one of his: some of his (in the Penkill Proofs )

  a youth named: a certain youth named (in The Crayon )

  beat in his ears.: beat in his ears and made him giddy (in The Germ and The Crayon )

  And, being again. . .would go out.: text not present in The Germ ; in The Crayon the passage reads: And the same night he wrote up inside his door the name of Bonaventura, that it might stop him when he would go out.

  lodging Chiaro: lodging he (in The Germ and The Crayon

  San Petronio was WMR's substitute for San Rocco in the proofs for the 1870 Poems , where DGR at first intended to print his story. The change was made because WMR pointed out that “this saint was not. . .born” until after the period imagined for the story (see Peattie, Letters of WMR, 221 and DGR's letter to WMR of 27 August 1869, Fredeman, Correspondence, 69. 139 ).

  Two long sentences describing Chiaro's room appear in The Germ and The Crayon texts but in none of the later ones; the room distinctly resembles the one DGR depicted in his 1849 study for The First Anniversary of the Death of Beatrice.

  that he painted: that Chiaro painted (in The Germ and The Crayon )

  the whole of a: the whole of the (in The Germ

  wall-paintings. . .picture by him: paintings in fresco. . .fresco by him (in The Germ and The Crayon

  Sometimes. . .smile: ;and sometimes, in the ecstasy of prayer, . . .solemn smile (in The Germ and The Crayon

  on his soul): on his soul like the dove of the Trinitry): (in The Germ and The Crayon

  gracious Italian Art: gracious and holy Italian art—with her virginal bosom, and her unfathomable eyes, and the thread of sunlight round her brows (in The Germ and The Crayon

  into the shadow: into the circle of the shadow (in The Germ , The Crayon , and the Penkill Proofs )

  in the pursuit: in pursuit (in The Crayon )

  influence. . .the world: impress the beholder; and, in doing this, he did not choose for his medium the action and passion of human life, but cold symbolism and abstract impersonation (in The Germ and The Crayon )

  wrought. . .loved: not in The Germ or The Crayon

  them the measure: them, as they must certainly have done, the measure: deleted in the Penkill Proofs

  would begin to. . .San Rocco: would begin, as it were, to. . .San Petronio (in The Germ and The Crayon

  pictures: frescoes (in The Germ and The Crayon )

  Golaghiotta: of Golaghiotta (in in The Germ )

  He was like. . .is not known: It was as though, scaling a great steepness, he heard his own voice echoed in some place much higher than he could see, and the name of which was not known (in The Fortnightly Review )

  hast: hadst (in The Germ )

  be: be so (in The Germ and The Crayon )

   In the sentence “Think not of Him; but of his love and thy love.” the pronoun “his” was printed in lower case, but in certain copies DGR has made a hand correction to capitalize the word. “God is no morbid exactor”: hand corrected by DGR to “with God is no lust of godhead” in the copy of the pamphlet that DGR gave to William Sharp (see Sharp, DGR: A Record and a Study 297-298.) . This is the copy now at Texas.

  His wrath: in the Penkill Proofs DGR initially corrected this to “each man's” but then restored the initial reading

  provoking of blood,: the comma accidentally dropped from the printed text, and was made as a hand correction by DGR in certain of the pamphlet copies.

  Pitti: not in The Crayon

  subject and: subject of (in The Germ and The Crayon )

Glosses:

title  See WMR's note, (1911)

epigraph  The passage is from the third stanza of Urbiciani's Canzonetta. (How He Dreams of his Lady) , which DGR translated in his The Early Italian Poets (pages 80-82). This is the third strophe, which DGR translated well but rather freely.

1  DGR chooses Cimabue (1240?-1302) to establish the historical context for his imaginary tale of Chiaro, who is represented in the story as a kind of John the Baptist to Cimabue's Christ (see the reference below in this paragraph to John 1: 23: “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias”).

2  Pfordresher describes Chiaro and other names in the story as a “quasi-allegorical . . . playing on Italian roots.”: so “Chiaro means clear, bright, transparent (in reference to color), and serves as a punning allusion to the brightness and clarity of Pre-Raphaelite pictures. Erma comes from ‘Ermies’/ Hermes Mercury, messenger from the gods, with a probable play on ‘ermetico’—airtight, the artist sealed off from light” (115). Dr. Aemmster also involves a pun: “In German an ‘Amme’ is a wet nurse or (if one wishes to reach for an extreme meaning) an asexual orgasm.” (115)

3  Although sometimes read as a pure fiction, Giunta Pisano was in fact an obscure thirteenth-century painter. DGR probably means the learned to catch this reference, as well as a possible oblique reference to the celebrated sculptor Niccolo Pisano.

7  Pfordresher: “Chiaro's rival Bonaventura is lucky, ‘buono’—good and per avventura by chance or good fortune” (115).

11  girded up his loins: Job 38: 3.

12  of the heaven, heavenly: compare I Corinthians 15:47 (“of the earth, earthy”). hardly in her ninth year: DGR glances at the famous first meeting of Dante with Beatrice, recorded in the Vita Nuova.

20  Ghergiotti: from “ghiotto” greedy, gluttonous. Marotoli: The Marotoli, notes Pfordresher, die in the sea, the “mare” for which they are named.

26  The vision partly recalls the apparitions of the Virgin Mary recorded in the lore surrounding her, and partly the figure of Diotima that Socrates speaks of in the Symposium.

32  Give thou to God . . . : recalls Christ's reply to the Pharisees (recorded e.g. in Matthew 22:15-22); for his heart is as thine: this phrase is crucial for understanding the rest of the soul's remarks. One must note the lower case in the pronoun “his”, as well as the sequence of similar lower case pronouns. These all reference the word “man”, and they are to be sharply distinguished from the upper case pronouns that reference the word “God”; Not till thou. . .be lost: this figure anticipates the scene DGR will stage much later in his Willowwood sonnets. It comprises an unusual interpretation of the Narcissus legend. The bent figure of Narcissus is imagined as a kneeling figure, and as such is invested with the virtues of devotion and humility.

39  The Raphael painting is a fiction.

41  Manus Animam pinxit (the hand painted the soul).

42  Schizzo d'autore incerto (Sketch by an unknown author). Guido: The narrator refers ironically to works by the baroque painter Guido Reni (1575-1642), who would have epitomized—in Pre-Raphaelite eyes—the decadence of Raphael's influence.

46  The Italian exchange runs: “How do I know?”: “mystic stuff. These English are mad about mysticism--it's like those fogs they have over there. It makes them think of their country: ‘and melts their heart in sighs the day they have said farewell to their sweet friends’”.

47  “The night, you mean.”

49  The French reads: “And you . . . what do you think of this painting?”

50  The French reads: “Me? . . . I, my dear fellow, say that it's a specialty with which I cannot be bothered. I hold that when one can't understand a thing it's therefore of no importance.”