Jenny's Plight
I realize this is a bit too long but oh well.
D.G. Rossetti's poem "Jenny" allows the reader a short glimpse into the life of a Victorian-era prostitute, as seen through the eyes of a scholarly and relatively sympathetic potential client. The narrator, who remains unnamed throughout the poem, spends a night in Jenny's quarters watching her sleep with her head resting on his knee. It is here that he quietly contemplates her life, her place in society, and his own biased ideas surrounding her supposedly shameful and degraded lifestyle.
Despite his own previous experience with it, the narrator's opinion that prostitution is a shameful practice comes out plainly as he addresses Jenny, though the reader can infer that he is more sympathetic to her plight than many might be. He regards her as beautiful, addresses her as "poor, shameful Jenny," (18) and then admits to himself that she may be grateful for his company merely due to the fact that he is not a violent drunkard. He wonders to himself if she is thankful for this moment of rest from her own "heart-sickness," (70) though the reader is never given any indication as to Jenny's actual thoughts about her position in life. Later, the narrator mentions that, more likely, Jenny is glad to rest for a while away from society's hypocritical condemnation of her free-willed and well-paid lifestyle, as opposed to the pallid "ill-clad" and "toil-worn"(74) girl who is praised for her subservience, chastity, and purity. The pale-faced girl's mockery of Jenny, the narrator suggests, has much less to do with her supposedly virtuous nature than it does with her own envy at Jenny's expensive clothing and Jenny's lack of a husband to tie her down and keep her "weak."
After thinking for a while about Jenny's life out in the streets, where the narrator imagines her lifting her skirt and "advertiz[ing] [her] dainties through the dirt. . ." (146) he wonders how Jenny might respond if he were to speak these thoughts aloud. He compares her mind to a book - a "volume seldom read" (158) which is inclined to close when left open halfway. He seems to doubt that she would truly comprehend or pay any mind to his musings, and again projects his own beliefs onto her, claiming that her mind has been "desecrated" by "contagious currents." (65, 66) Later, the narrator says that Jenny is "Like a rose shut in a book / In which pure women may not look" (253, 254) - the book in this case seems to be a metaphor for society's tendency to regard knowledge and learning as more "pure" than desires of the flesh. Jenny is the rose hidden within - she knows the real truth about society's lustful inner workings, hidden as they may be from the fairer sex.
It comes to the narrator presently the similarity between Jenny as she sleeps and his own cousin Nell. He realizes that all women were, in a sense, made from the same lump of clay, and compares his simple-minded Nell, "so mere a woman" (187) who is "fond of dress, and change, and praise" (186) to this girl in his lap. It occurs to him that the two women are not so different - this Nell of his is fond of love just as Jenny is, and yet he finds himself proud of her. The narrator eventually comes to claim that he sees Jenny as "A cipher of man's changeless sum / Of lust, past, present, and to come. . ." (278, 279) He believes that she is not truly responsible for her own plight, but a victim of man's own lust and cruel nature, though he does not seem inclined to blame himself for helping to perpetuate the problem.
As dawn breaks, the narrator wakes the girl from her sleep, feeling more sympathetic to Jenny than he did previously. Where at first he regarded her as lazy and shameless, he now attempts to leave without disturbing her rest, and leaves gold pieces for her despite the two seemingly having never consummated their "relationship." He hopes that when she wakes and sees that he has left, and gone without, so to speak, she will be reminded of days past when she had woken to two pillows instead of one. He seems to regret that, although he feels he has been changed by the experience, he must leave and resume society's mocking ways towards her and her ilk lest he be seen as impure as well.
Works Cited
Rossetti, Dante Gabriel. “Jenny.” Practa.com. September 21st, 2006. http://www.shlensky.com/assigned_readings/D.G.Rossetti-Jenny.pdf
D.G. Rossetti's poem "Jenny" allows the reader a short glimpse into the life of a Victorian-era prostitute, as seen through the eyes of a scholarly and relatively sympathetic potential client. The narrator, who remains unnamed throughout the poem, spends a night in Jenny's quarters watching her sleep with her head resting on his knee. It is here that he quietly contemplates her life, her place in society, and his own biased ideas surrounding her supposedly shameful and degraded lifestyle.
Despite his own previous experience with it, the narrator's opinion that prostitution is a shameful practice comes out plainly as he addresses Jenny, though the reader can infer that he is more sympathetic to her plight than many might be. He regards her as beautiful, addresses her as "poor, shameful Jenny," (18) and then admits to himself that she may be grateful for his company merely due to the fact that he is not a violent drunkard. He wonders to himself if she is thankful for this moment of rest from her own "heart-sickness," (70) though the reader is never given any indication as to Jenny's actual thoughts about her position in life. Later, the narrator mentions that, more likely, Jenny is glad to rest for a while away from society's hypocritical condemnation of her free-willed and well-paid lifestyle, as opposed to the pallid "ill-clad" and "toil-worn"(74) girl who is praised for her subservience, chastity, and purity. The pale-faced girl's mockery of Jenny, the narrator suggests, has much less to do with her supposedly virtuous nature than it does with her own envy at Jenny's expensive clothing and Jenny's lack of a husband to tie her down and keep her "weak."
After thinking for a while about Jenny's life out in the streets, where the narrator imagines her lifting her skirt and "advertiz[ing] [her] dainties through the dirt. . ." (146) he wonders how Jenny might respond if he were to speak these thoughts aloud. He compares her mind to a book - a "volume seldom read" (158) which is inclined to close when left open halfway. He seems to doubt that she would truly comprehend or pay any mind to his musings, and again projects his own beliefs onto her, claiming that her mind has been "desecrated" by "contagious currents." (65, 66) Later, the narrator says that Jenny is "Like a rose shut in a book / In which pure women may not look" (253, 254) - the book in this case seems to be a metaphor for society's tendency to regard knowledge and learning as more "pure" than desires of the flesh. Jenny is the rose hidden within - she knows the real truth about society's lustful inner workings, hidden as they may be from the fairer sex.
It comes to the narrator presently the similarity between Jenny as she sleeps and his own cousin Nell. He realizes that all women were, in a sense, made from the same lump of clay, and compares his simple-minded Nell, "so mere a woman" (187) who is "fond of dress, and change, and praise" (186) to this girl in his lap. It occurs to him that the two women are not so different - this Nell of his is fond of love just as Jenny is, and yet he finds himself proud of her. The narrator eventually comes to claim that he sees Jenny as "A cipher of man's changeless sum / Of lust, past, present, and to come. . ." (278, 279) He believes that she is not truly responsible for her own plight, but a victim of man's own lust and cruel nature, though he does not seem inclined to blame himself for helping to perpetuate the problem.
As dawn breaks, the narrator wakes the girl from her sleep, feeling more sympathetic to Jenny than he did previously. Where at first he regarded her as lazy and shameless, he now attempts to leave without disturbing her rest, and leaves gold pieces for her despite the two seemingly having never consummated their "relationship." He hopes that when she wakes and sees that he has left, and gone without, so to speak, she will be reminded of days past when she had woken to two pillows instead of one. He seems to regret that, although he feels he has been changed by the experience, he must leave and resume society's mocking ways towards her and her ilk lest he be seen as impure as well.
Works Cited
Rossetti, Dante Gabriel. “Jenny.” Practa.com. September 21st, 2006. http://www.shlensky.com/assigned_readings/D.G.Rossetti-Jenny.pdf
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