William michael rossetti biography of alberta death

It features both a biographical introduction

Rossetti received a copy of Leaves of Grass soon after its publication, as a gift from William Bell Scott, who had been introduced to it by Thomas Dixon of Sunderland. Rossetti responded enthusiastically and discussed it with many other British writers, among them Swinburne. O'Connor, and Whitman himself. It was reprinted in several publications in the United States.

At the suggestion of Moncure D. Conway, who gained Whitman's permission for the publication of a selection of his poems, with a few changes in text, and at the invitation of London publisher John Camden Hotten, Rossetti agreed to edit a selection of Leaves of Grass from the edition, omitting any poem he thought likely to offend English readers and censors.

His editing of Whitman's Poems , including the Preface which Whitman doubted was worth republishing , was a major event in the growth of Whitman's reputation and readership in America and Europe. Rossetti's prefatory notice admitted that Whitman had what Rossetti considered many faults of diction and subject matter, but asserted that Whitman was among the greatest poets of the English language.

Rossetti's edition contained about one half of the text; the poems included were printed without omissions or emendations, though a few changes were made in the text of the Preface. Rossetti insisted that his edition was unexpurgated and only preliminary to an English publication of the complete Leaves of Grass , but O'Connor and Whitman had strong reservations about it, and Whitman later referred to it as "the horrible dismemberment of my book" Correspondence Throughout the rest of his life Rossetti championed Whitman, praising him even in his edition of Longfellow as by far the greatest American poet.

In Rossetti published American Poems , "dedicated with homage and love to Walt Whitman," including 32 poems by Whitman. He brought out a new edition of Whitman's Poems in Rossetti's letters and diaries contain many references to Whitman and show his deep affection for Whitman as poet and correspondent, as well as his sympathy with Whitman's social and political ideals.

Rossetti was important in the editing and publishing of Anne Gilchrist's "An Englishwoman's Estimate of Walt Whitman" Boston Radical , , and suggested the beginning of the correspondence between Whitman and Mrs.