The Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood

by Jan Marsh

Who were the women who sat for the Pre-Raphaelite painters?

Muses to an exclusively male genius, of tragic stature and uncertain health — were they indeed as passive as their portrait painters and critics contrived to suggest?

Jan Marsh reveals the actual lives behind the myth of the Pre-Raphaelite women: Elizabeth Siddal, Emma Brown, Annie Miller, Fannie Cornforth, Jane Morris and Georgiana Burne-Jones.

A meticulous testimony, this book at last records the rare vitality of these gifted and ambitious women.

Delivering them from a century of masculine misrepresentation, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood is a fascinating tribute to their spirit of independence in circumstances which conspired to suppress it.

Praise for The Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood

‘It turns the familiar terrain of Pre-Raphaelitism on its axis, giving new history, new life to the previously silent subject of the paintings’ – Times Literary Supplement

‘Required reading for all future historians of the movement’ – The Times

‘Is essential for serious collections in art history, women's studies, or literature.’ – The Library Journal

Praise for Jan Marsh

“An excellent addition to Bloomsbury studies that will be of interest to both devotees and newcomers.” – Publishers Weekly

“Jan Marsh's book is the best researched and fullest biography of Rossetti we have yet had.” - Fiona MacCarthy, New York Review of Books

“The author's steady, sympathetic course through Rossetti's divided life enables readers to delve into the intense and original self most fully expressed in her poetry.” - Kirkus Review

Jan Marsh (b.1942) has written a number of ground-breaking biographies, including Bloomsbury Women, Jane and May Morris, The Legend of Elizabeth Siddal and her highly acclaimed work Christina Rossetti. She has also scripted arts documentary programmes for radio and television, and has curated exhibitions of work by women painters of the Pre-Raphaelite movement. She is a contributor to the Dictionary of Women Artists and a frequent lecturer in Britain, North America and Japan.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction, History, Biography, Art History, Pre Raphaelite, 19th Century

406 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1985

Reviews

[F · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a wonderful introduction to the Pre-Raphaelite women -and their men, to an extent. We learn about the so-called muses' private and public life, their relationship with their crafts, the struggles they endured to keep practising them, and how they renegotiated their identities within the social structure and demands of their time. Marsh does a wonderful job in reconstructing those stories accompanied by extremely interesting and relevant socio-historical contextualisation, which makes this book not only a multiple biography but also a portrayal of womanhood -from the prostitute to the lady- in the Victorian age. On the downside, in several instances I've felt the writing could be better. Nevertheless, it remains a very good piece of research.

[Ophelia Sings · Rating 5 out of 5]

Over thirty years after its original publication, Jan Marsh's seminal book on the women who populated the paintings - and beds - of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood remains the defining work on the subject. As compelling now as it was in the 1980s, The Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood remains fresh and timeless. Chronicling the private lives of the models whose faces are so familiar to us, Marsh brings their stories vividly to life; their tragedies, triumphs, loves and lives echo vibrantly down the years. Marsh succeeds in placing the women in their time; part social history, we come to understand how the period stymied females and cast them aside if they did not conform to society's strictures and - often hypocritical - mores. She also explodes the many myths which have grown up surrounding the women in question; so 'other' have they become, it is easy to lose sight of the facts, which are often even more tragic and incredible than any legend.

While the intervening years have seen the publication of many wonderful books about the women of the Pre-Raphaelite movement - Lucinda Hawkesly's wonderful work on Lizzie Siddall and Kirsty Stonell Walker's lively and engaging biography of Fanny Cornforth, most notably - The Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood remains the go-to for anyone with a keen interest in the subject, whether long-standing or new-found. Absolutely essential reading, it's fantastic that this previously relatively hard-to-find title is now available, modestly priced, for Kindle. Unmissable.

My sincere thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[lisa_emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

A pretty decent book about the other half of that famous art movement, and a good look on how women contributed to the Pre-Raphaelites.

[Margaret Conmey · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mis leading title !
I was hoping that this book would explore the relationships and friendships between the ‘pre-Raphaelite sisters’ and how they supported each other during turbulent times during their relationships with the PRB men and their artwork.
Despite claiming to be written from a feminist perspective, the women were mainly represented via their relationships ( especially romantic/sexual ) with the more famous male artists.

Disappointing

[Albertine67 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid work and reasonably interesting. Not hugely interested in pre raphaelites (men or women), but had read about Kipling spending time with the Burne-Joneses, particularly during his childhood (GBJ was his mother's sister), which seemed a curious connection...

[Alyssa Grady · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book for thesis research and found it very intriguing. It brings 6 of the women involved with the PRB into a sharp light, defining them as women of their age but also beyond it in subtle ways.

[Kara Mealer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dense but still readable. She delves into great detail about their lives, but also puts their histories into a larger context.

[Mer]

https://hardcover.app/books/pre-rapha...

[Jan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Repetitive and overly detailed. Pages were devoted to what it meant that Siddel was a milliner and her father an iron monger. And then repeated later in the same chapter. I just could not read this. Perhaps if I stuck with it I would have been more impressed.

[Tania · Rating 4 out of 5]

This concentrates mainly on the lives of Lizzie Siddal, Emma Brown, Annie Miller, Georgie Burne Jones, Fanny Cornforth, and Jane Burden. It was a slow start for me, but picked up towards the middle and turned into an interesting read.

[Lana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although it can be rather dragging, and a little bit long, it is very astute in some of it's assumptions as well as being very thorough with information.

[FeralBritt]

I was inspired to read this book because of the Pre-Raphaelite paintings at Tate Britain - https://betweenfictionandfact.wordpre...

[Helen]

The book tells the stories of some of the most famous of the pre-Raphaelite 'stunners' - Lizzie Siddal, Fanny Cornforth, Annie Miller, Jane Morris, Emma Brown and Georgiana Burne-Jones. I like the fact that this book gives a more rounded picture of women we know only from their painted representations and a few sensational myths. Marsh is also good on the socio-economic realities of the life of working-class girls and their sometimes uneasy relationships with the middle-class painters for whom they were muses, wives, partners, lovers, pupils.

I'm far more interested in the lives of Jane Morris and Lizzie Siddal than I am in the lives of William Morris and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. The men are fairly straightforward, it's the women who are mysterious, enigmatic, fascinating. I want to get to know the women behind the paintings. What did they think about as they posed? Were they bored? What did they think of the paintings, did they recognise themselves, identify with the women they portrayed? Why does Jane always look so miserable, even angry, in photographs of her? [July 2004]