Rossetti's Poem- Cousin Kate Flashcards
Summary of Cousin Kate
I was an unmarried young woman who was used to working outside in the elements. I was happy with my simple cottage life and companions, unconcerned with my looks. Why did a high-ranking nobleman have to notice me and compliment my blonde hair? Why did a high-ranking nobleman have to notice me and make me care about him?
The lord tempted me to go to his luxurious house. How foolish of me for having some fun there, for shamelessly entering into a shameful sexual relationship with him. I felt like both a toy for the lord to play with and someone he deeply cared about. He treated me like an accessory, trying me out as a partner as if he were trying on a silk necktie, and changing me out for another woman as if he were taking off a pair of gloves. So now I’m stuck crying and complaining, as someone who has lost her chastity and is no longer a virgin, even though I had the potential to be a perfect model of purity.
Oh Lady Kate, my cousin Kate. You became more beautiful than I was. The lord noticed you standing by the gate in front of your father’s house and decided to pursue you romantically, tossing me aside. He watched you walk along the country road and working in the rye fields. He elevated you from your humble, lower-class life to a higher social standing.
Because you were so moral and a virgin, the lord took decided to ask you to marry him. The local townspeople praise you for being virtuous and sexually pure, while they consider me unfit for society. And while I’m stuck in a lowly, working-class home and crying out in grief, you’re surrounded by wealth and sing out with joy. Now, which one of us has more compassion? You had more determination, which allowed you to rise above me like a bird with stronger wings.
Oh Kate, my cousin, my love for the lord was genuine and deep, whereas your love was weak and could be easily washed away, like a message written in sand. If the lord had seduced you instead of me, and if you were in my shoes, the lord wouldn’t have been able to win me over with his affection or his wealth. Instead, I would have spit in his face and denied his hand in marriage.
However, I have a blessing that you don’t have and likely never will. It’s even more valuable than all of your fancy new clothes and your wedding ring, and I can tell that this bothers you. I have my blond-haired son, who is a reminder of my shame at my impure actions, but who’s also what I’m most proud of. Son, hold onto me tightly, and even more tightly. Your father will probably pass his wealth and status onto you so that he can carry on the family name.
How is Gender, Morality, and Hypocrisy shown in Cousin Kate?
Christina Rossetti published “Cousin Kate” in 1862, during Britain’s Victorian era—a period in which when gender biases created starkly different social expectations for men and women. While it was generally acceptable for men to give in to sexual temptations, women were expected to be chaste and uphold the moral fabric of society. At the same time, however, women were taught to be submissive towards the men in their lives. “Cousin Kate” shows how such narrow, gendered expectations thus lead to a sort of catch-22 for women, as the speaker obediently submits herself to the sexual desires of a powerful lord, yet, in doing so, becomes a social outcast. As such, the poem implicitly critiques the gender ideals of the Victorian era, presenting them as conflicting, hypocritical, and essentially burdening women with the impossible charge of both obeying and resisting the much more powerful men in their lives.
The poem clearly establishes how conventional gender roles create a power imbalance that increases the speaker’s societal vulnerability. The speaker describes herself as a pure, happy young woman before “a great lord” notices her, compliments her beauty, and seduces her. As a man, the lord is free to do whatever he wants, while the speaker is merely the object of his actions; he treats her like a “plaything” rather than a human being. Yet as a woman (and a lower-class one at that), the speaker is subordinate to the lord and therefore under pressure to bow to his whims—even if doing so represents a supposed moral transgression on the speaker’s part.
The speaker then faces severe social consequences for the affair while the lord is not. The speaker’s community views her as “unclean” and as “an outcast thing” for failing to uphold her moral duty to remain a virgin. And as a result of her sexual impurity, the speaker is considered unfit for marriage—which was important for Victorian women’s survival—and publicly shamed. Unlike the speaker, however, the lord’s sexual activities leave his perceived fitness as a husband and social status unaffected. The lord easily takes the speaker’s “good and pure” cousin Kate as a wife and the two of them “sit … on high.”
The speaker resents her cousin for failing to stick by her female relative’s side, demonstrating how such hypocritical gender standards pit women against each other as they compete for the affection of men. The speaker tells Kate that if the circumstances were reversed and the lord “fooled” Kate rather than the speaker, the speaker would have spit in the lord’s face and denied his hand in marriage. Thus although Kate’s chastity labels her “good and pure,” the speaker indicates that Kate was wrong to overlook the lord’s treatment of the speaker. The speaker even emphasizes their relationship when she refers to Kate explicitly as “cousin,” suggesting that Kate has betrayed familial loyalty.
At the same time, however, Kate is clearly subject to the same power imbalances that the speaker deals with. The speaker does not claim that these circumstances absolve Kate of wrongdoing and instead holds her to a moral standard that requires more than sexual purity; in doing so, the speaker implicitly rejects sexual virtue as the ultimate marker of women’s social value.
The speaker seems to imply that women should stick together in the face of such blatant hypocrisy, yet she, too, ultimately aims to one-up her cousin—declaring that having a son by the lord ties her to him just as strongly as any marriage contract, and that knowledge of this makes her cousin “fret,” or worry. Such an ending underscores how few options women had within the oppressive gender norms of Victorian society—and how even playing by the supposed rules was no guarantee of success, since the game would always be rigged against them.
How is Lust, Love, and Temptation shown in Cousin Kate?
Each of the characters in the poem faces the temptations of love and lust. The lord’s lust for the speaker incites her love and, in turn, compromises her purity, while Kate’s material desires cause her to betray the speaker. Through their stories, the poem suggests that both genuine love and its shallower cousin, lust, can be dangerous. It reads like a cautionary tale about unchecked desire in general, suggesting how this may tempt people to stray from their (societally-imposed) moral principles.
Most obviously, the lord’s lustful advances tempt the speaker into acting in a way that society has deemed sinful. The speaker is “not mindful [she is] fair” before the lord expresses his attraction to her. In other words, she isn’t overly concerned with vanity before the lord steps in. Yet once he begins “praising” her hair, things change. His compliments signal that the lord is infatuated with the speaker’s looks and that, for him, their relationship is about shallow physical desires rather than deep connection.
His lust is also clearly a selfish emotion, given that he doesn’t seem to care that his desires prove so disastrous for the speaker. Indeed, the speaker lives a happy, simple life before the lord “[fills] her heart with care.” She claims that if the lord hadn’t gone and noticed her, she “might have been a dove,” indicating that her struggles to maintain moral purity stem from her feelings for the lord. The speaker knows their affair is “shameful” but it feels “shameless.” Her intense desires for the lord confuse her sense of decency and ultimately make her “unclean” in her neighbours’ eyes. The speaker’s inability to uphold her moral duties makes her unfit for society or a husband, leaving her to “sit and howl in dust.” Love, then, rather than bringing the speaker joy or connection, leads only to her downfall.
Kate’s longing to increase her wealth and social standing, meanwhile, acts as its own form of lust. This ultimately overwhelms her Victorian moral sensibilities, causing her to betray her cousin. The speaker accuses Kate of materialism, implying that Kate disregards her familial obligation to side with the speaker so that Kate can access the lord’s money and status. For example, the speaker insinuates that the lord is able to buy Kate’s love “with his land.” The speaker also calls out some of the fancy belongings, like “clothes and [a] wedding-ring,” that Kate has now that the lord has “lifted” her to a higher class.
The speaker, for her part, insists that her feelings for the lord are categorically different from Kate’s. The speaker repeatedly compares Kate’s love, which was “writ in sand” to her own “true” love for the lord, suggesting that Kate’s material lust is a less stable, less honourable foundation for a relationship than the speaker’s own feelings. At the same time, of course, the fact that her love was supposedly pure does not change the speaker’s status as a fallen woman. Romantic entanglements in general, the poem implies, are a risky business—in that they can lead people to stray from a more virtuous path.
Birds symbol meaning?
The birds in “Cousin Kate” represent female sexual purity. The symbol first appears in line 16, when the speaker says she “might have been a dove.” Doves are small birds with white feathers and have long been used to represent purity. The speaker uses this familiar image to suggest that if the lord had not seduced her, she might have maintained her chastity and therefore could have been seen as a representation of female virtue.
The speaker reprises the metaphor in the fourth stanza when she asks whether she or Kate has the “tenderer heart,” or more compassion. She then states that Kate “had the stronger wing,” meaning that Kate has greater moral determination, and has risen above the speaker to achieve greater purity. The speaker contrasts this with her own tenderness towards the lord and implies that her genuine care for him weakens her “wing,” or ability to remain chaste.
In the Christian tradition, birds, and especially doves, indicate the presence of the Holy Spirit. As a woman’s chastity was seen as evidence of her piety during the Victorian era and Rossetti was deeply religious, this tradition reinforces the association between birds and sexual purity within the poem.
Clothing and Accessories symbol meaning?
Throughout the poem, various articles of clothing and pieces of jewelry signify the relative strength of different characters’ relationships to the lord. For example, the speaker says that the lord “wore [her] like a silken knot” and “changed [her] like a glove.” The lord treats the speaker like she is a disposable—an accessory that can be tried on at will and easily taken off. Thus, the accessories that describe the speaker’s relationship with the lord represent the impermanence of his attention and affection for her.
Later in the poem, the wedding ring that the lord gives Kate “binds” her to him. In contrast to the accessories that characterize the speaker’s short-lived relationship with the lord, this ring symbolizes a lasting bond—the permanence of his marriage to Kate. However, in the final stanza, the speaker gloats that this ring, along with all of the other fancy clothes that the lord gives Kate, cannot tie her to the lord as strongly as giving him a son would. In the end, the coronet that the lord will presumably give to the speaker’s son represents the strongest bond of all—the wealth and status a father bestows on his son.
Gift symbol meaning?
The “gift” the speaker refers to symbolizes her son. This language has resonances with Christian descriptions of children as gifts from God, and especially mirrors Psalm 127:3-5, translated as follows in the New King James Version:
Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.
As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth.
Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.
The speaker suggests that her child is a blessing from God, a reward that only God can give. She contrasts this divine gift with Kate’s “clothes and wedding-ring,” gifts from her husband that, no matter their earthly value, cannot be traded for a child. As such, the speaker gloats that although Kate has wealth, status, and the respect of the local townspeople, the speaker has still outdone her in at least one respect, as she is blessed with a “gift” that Kate can never have. Line 45 can be interpreted as a continuation of this biblical allusion; although the speaker is shamed for being an unmarried mother, her son is a most special and valuable “gift,” so she takes pride in him.
Literary Context
Christina Rossetti is one of the most well-known poets of the Victorian era. She is often praised for her natural lyrical gift—a strong command of form, meter, rhyme, and straightforward language. Rossetti’s mastery of verse gives her poems an air of simplicity on the surface, while its secondary meanings are subtle and implicit.
Rossetti admired fellow 19th-century poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning, to whom she is often compared. Goblin Market and Other Poems, Rossetti’s first book, was published in 1862, the year after Barrett Browning died. Rossetti was seen as Barrett Browning’s natural successor, the next great woman poet of the time. However, Rossetti’s work was less overtly political, more concerned with the actions of individuals rather than broad social reform. While both poets often explored religious themes, Rossetti’s work is much more straightforward in its ideas and language.
Rossetti grew up in an artistically gifted family of writers, painters, and scholars. Her most accomplished family member was her older brother, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, who co-founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, an artistic group focused on imitating nature and painting realistically with vivid color and detailed imagery. While Christina Rossetti was never an official member, she had close relationships with group members and published poems in their periodical.
The group’s influence is reflected in Rossetti’s minute attention to detail, pastoral settings, use of symbolism, and medieval inspiration (such as the ballad form). Dante Gabriel was also instrumental to Rossetti’s poetic output in other ways: he encouraged her to submit her poems to publications, created art for her books, negotiated with publishers, and corresponded with Rossetti extensively to provide feedback on her work.
“Cousin Kate” is an example of a dramatic monologue, a form in which the speaker is a specific character who addresses someone—the reader, the poet, or another character—who remains silent. The dramatic monologue was emerging as a new form around the time Rossetti wrote “Cousin Kate.” It was popularized by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (“Ulysses”) and Robert Browning (“My Last Duchess”), among other contemporary poets, including Rossetti herself.
Historical Context
Rossetti wrote “Cousin Kate” during Britain’s Victorian era, the period from 1837 to 1901 during which Queen Victoria of England ruled. Victorian gender roles were incredibly strict and narrow, and as a result men and women were held to vastly different social standards.
Women were seen as the property of men and were taught to obey men’s wishes. It was common for men to have extramarital affairs without consequence, while women—who were expected to be sexually pure—were ostracized for the same behavior. Thus, women had to both obey men’s wishes and deny their sexual advances. Furthermore, since women had little opportunity to rise in social class, worsened by the extreme wealth gaps of the Victorian era, they had to compete with one another to win over possible husbands.
Additionally, the Rossetti family was swept up in the Oxford Movement, a mid-19th-century revival of Catholicism in Britain that sought to restore older Christian traditions. Many of its prominent practitioners, known as Tractarians, were poets, such as John Henry Newman and John Keble. Rossetti was deeply religious and her faith was essential to her poetic output. Tractarian influence can be observed in Rossetti’s interest in moral allegory and medieval verse forms, as well as her broader use of poetry to express religious concerns.
