Jan Marsh's Christina Rossetti: A Writer's Life is a
biographical account of the melancholy poet who waged "a life
long struggle with feminist desires" by constantly attempting to
reconcile her own often conflicting ideals towards religion,
ambition, familial obligation and the Victorian model of
womanhood. Marsh divides her work chronologically into four
convenient periods of Christina Rossetti's life: - Part One:
1830-50, - Part Two: 1850-60, - Part Three:1861-70 and - Part 4:
1871-94. While Marsh completes a more than adequate job of
chronicling both definitively major and seemingly minor events
of Christina's life, her addition of psychoanalytic commentary
and stylistic prowess combines with the facts to create a
biography that reads as smoothly as novel. Her insistent
reference to Gabriel and Frances Rossetti as Mama and Papa,
respectively, aid in the creation of a story-like telling of
Christina's life in which each historically relevant figure is
transformed into a significant player on the stage of Ch