DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI (1828–1892) was a central figure in nineteenth-century art circles. He was a painter himself and in 1848 co-founded the influential Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. His collection of translations, The Early Italian Poets, appeared in 1861; his Poems and Ballads and Sonnets were published in 1881., CLIVE WILMER Born in 1945, grew up in London and was educated at Cambridge, where he is now Associate Teaching Officer at Sidney Sussex and Fitzwilliam Colleges. He is also an Honorary Fellow of Anglia Polytechnic University Four of his books of poetry are published by Carcanet, of which the most recent is Selected Poems (1995). He has also edited selections from John Ruskin and William Morris and is currently working on a new edition of Ruskin’s Praeterita.

• Chapter 1 from The House of Life; Chapter 2 from Dante and His Circle: with the Italian Poets preceding him (1100–1200–1300);

DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI (1828–1892) was a central figure in nineteenth-century art circles. He was a painter himself and in 1848 co-founded the influential Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. His collection of translations, The Early Italian Poets, appeared in 1861; his Poems and Ballads and Sonnets were published in 1881., CLIVE WILMER Born in 1945, grew up in London and was educated at Cambridge, where he is now Associate Teaching Officer at Sidney Sussex and Fitzwilliam Colleges. He is also an Honorary Fellow of Anglia Polytechnic University Four of his books of poetry are published by Carcanet, of which the most recent is Selected Poems (1995). He has also edited selections from John Ruskin and William Morris and is currently working on a new edition of Ruskin’s Praeterita.

• Chapter 1 from The House of Life; Chapter 2 from Dante and His Circle: with the Italian Poets preceding him (1100–1200–1300);