Exploration of isolation in ‘Memory’ and ‘At Home’
In ‘At Home’ and ‘Memory’, Rossetti depicts isolation as a self-imposed sacrifice in an
attempt to seek solace over her unresolved desires. In life, she desired but ultimately
rejected earthly love to find closeness to God, with the shame of her temptation reflected in
her lamenting voice. However, perhaps in the incompatibility of her warring desires, the
ultimate source of her isolation is found. Her rejection of James Collins, supported by her
unwillingness to become a nun creates an image of a woman who in life could not resolve
her desires due to their incompatibility. As a result, Rossetti sacrifices herself to isolation,
providing a space where she can lament her conflicted state.
In both ‘At Home’ and ‘Memory’ Rossetti reflects on her isolation through an account of her
rejection of earthly desires. The reified form of her ‘memory’ introduced through her
observation: ‘I nursed it in my bosom’ describes her surrender of earthly love. The
juxtaposition of the impersonal pronoun ‘it’ with the maternal connotations of ‘nursed’
serves to describe her intentional rejection of love, reinforced by the antithetical pairing of
‘lived’ and ‘dead’, interlinking her love with the perishable nature of life. Moreover, the
completeness of Rossetti’s rejection is presented in her description: ‘In joy I sat alone, even
so I grieved’, as the placement of opposites ‘joy’ and ‘grieved’ at either end of the line, a
cyclical image of emotion is created, with the finality of her decision expressed through the
balance of the line. However, such finality is undermined by the iambic pentameter
underscoring her claims to resoluteness. The heartbeat rhythm of the metre serves as a
reminder of the continuation of her love despite her commitment to God, thus presenting
her conclusion of ‘Alone and nothing said’ in the first stanza not as a state induced by the
death of her love, but as a necessary sacrifice into isolation in order to maintain her
pretence of resolution. Similarly, in ‘At Home’, Rossetti’s isolation is explored through liminal
spaces initiated by the claim ‘when I was dead’. Due to the paradoxical nature of the
statement created by the incompatibility of the past continuous with the definite ‘dead’,
Rossetti’s extended metaphor of death allows her to occupy a transitive state in the form of
a ‘spirit’. The dualist nature of ‘spirit’ allows for Rossetti’s isolation to be understood by her
belief in the separation of the body and soul; her soul is committed to God; therefore, she
cannot fully associate with the earthly realm she occupies. As a result, Rossetti’s use of
dualism depicts her confinement to a life of reflection, summarised by her oxymoronic
lament ‘to stay and yet to part’. Overall, in both poems, Rossetti depicts her isolation as a
self-inflicted state, arising from her incomplete denial of earthly love, either through
evidence of remaining desire, or through her adoption of a transient sphere whereby her
only remaining tether to the earthly is in her physical body.
In ‘At Home’ and ‘Memory’, Rossetti presents isolation as a mechanism by which she can
honestly confess her distance from God. Rossetti’s claim to have ‘shut the door to face the
naked truth’ in ‘Memory’ allows her to explore her distance from God through the creation
of physical spaces. Through its ‘naked’ state within the conceit of a room, her memory is laid
exposed. As a result, the voice she uses to explore her ‘naked truth’ is allowed, like her
memory to be expressed without any ornamentation, evocative of an act of confession. Her
claim ‘I stood alone – I faced the truth alone’ subsequently takes on a personal tone, giving
In ‘At Home’ and ‘Memory’, Rossetti depicts isolation as a self-imposed sacrifice in an
attempt to seek solace over her unresolved desires. In life, she desired but ultimately
rejected earthly love to find closeness to God, with the shame of her temptation reflected in
her lamenting voice. However, perhaps in the incompatibility of her warring desires, the
ultimate source of her isolation is found. Her rejection of James Collins, supported by her
unwillingness to become a nun creates an image of a woman who in life could not resolve
her desires due to their incompatibility. As a result, Rossetti sacrifices herself to isolation,
providing a space where she can lament her conflicted state.
In both ‘At Home’ and ‘Memory’ Rossetti reflects on her isolation through an account of her
rejection of earthly desires. The reified form of her ‘memory’ introduced through her
observation: ‘I nursed it in my bosom’ describes her surrender of earthly love. The
juxtaposition of the impersonal pronoun ‘it’ with the maternal connotations of ‘nursed’
serves to describe her intentional rejection of love, reinforced by the antithetical pairing of
‘lived’ and ‘dead’, interlinking her love with the perishable nature of life. Moreover, the
completeness of Rossetti’s rejection is presented in her description: ‘In joy I sat alone, even
so I grieved’, as the placement of opposites ‘joy’ and ‘grieved’ at either end of the line, a
cyclical image of emotion is created, with the finality of her decision expressed through the
balance of the line. However, such finality is undermined by the iambic pentameter
underscoring her claims to resoluteness. The heartbeat rhythm of the metre serves as a
reminder of the continuation of her love despite her commitment to God, thus presenting
her conclusion of ‘Alone and nothing said’ in the first stanza not as a state induced by the
death of her love, but as a necessary sacrifice into isolation in order to maintain her
pretence of resolution. Similarly, in ‘At Home’, Rossetti’s isolation is explored through liminal
spaces initiated by the claim ‘when I was dead’. Due to the paradoxical nature of the
statement created by the incompatibility of the past continuous with the definite ‘dead’,
Rossetti’s extended metaphor of death allows her to occupy a transitive state in the form of
a ‘spirit’. The dualist nature of ‘spirit’ allows for Rossetti’s isolation to be understood by her
belief in the separation of the body and soul; her soul is committed to God; therefore, she
cannot fully associate with the earthly realm she occupies. As a result, Rossetti’s use of
dualism depicts her confinement to a life of reflection, summarised by her oxymoronic
lament ‘to stay and yet to part’. Overall, in both poems, Rossetti depicts her isolation as a
self-inflicted state, arising from her incomplete denial of earthly love, either through
evidence of remaining desire, or through her adoption of a transient sphere whereby her
only remaining tether to the earthly is in her physical body.
In ‘At Home’ and ‘Memory’, Rossetti presents isolation as a mechanism by which she can
honestly confess her distance from God. Rossetti’s claim to have ‘shut the door to face the
naked truth’ in ‘Memory’ allows her to explore her distance from God through the creation
of physical spaces. Through its ‘naked’ state within the conceit of a room, her memory is laid
exposed. As a result, the voice she uses to explore her ‘naked truth’ is allowed, like her
memory to be expressed without any ornamentation, evocative of an act of confession. Her
claim ‘I stood alone – I faced the truth alone’ subsequently takes on a personal tone, giving
