Goblin Market (Signed Ltd.)

London. Fine/Near Fine. Limited to 410 copies signed by the illustrator, of which this is 331. Fine book bound in original vellum with gilt to spine and front board. Pictorial endpapers. Housed in a Near Fine slipcase with original paper label to top panel and retaining the original glassine jacket in exceptionally nice condition with trivial nicking to top edges.

Among Christina Rossetti's most influential works, here her poem is combined with the dark and seductive illustrations of Rackham. "Set in a fairy world and exploring themes of temptation, sacrifice, and salvation, Goblin Market tells the story of a fraught encounter between two (truncated) sisters, Laura and Lizzie, and evil goblin merchants.” (BL). In exchange for goblin fruit, Laura gives them a piece of her hair, but after eating all the fruit begins to waste away. To save her sister Lizzie, bravely goes to the market, and resists the goblins attempts at force-feeding her. Laura kisses the juice off her sister's cheeks and is miraculously, but painfully, healed. Years later, Laura and Lizzie describe their experience in the goblin market to their own children as a cautionary tale about the importance of sisterly love. Scholars have read the poem as a morality tale about temptation and sexual violence, while others interpret it as a veiled critique of capitalism and industrialized England.

Arthur Rackham (1867-1939) is perhaps the most acclaimed and influential illustrator of the Golden Age of Illustration. A prolific artist even from his youth, Rackham got his start as an illustrator working for the Westminster Budget Newspaper (1892). Over the next few years, he took on more and more commissions for children’s books, hitting his career high in the first three decades of the twentieth century. Rackham turned his imaginative pen to every classic—from Shakespeare to Dickens to Poe. Fine in Near Fine dust jacket. (Inventory #: 4138)