Consumers of Intoxicating Fruits and Elixirs: The Cognitive Grammar of Christina Rossetti’s and Ford Madox Ford’s Oriental Fairy Tales

The fourth chapter provides a cognitive grammar analysis of Christina Rossetti’s and Ford’s Oriental fairy poetry and narrative fictionalising scenes of drug consumption. Like consumers of banj (hashish) and opium, Rossetti’s and Ford’s characters (the petrified banqueters, Laura, the princess wearing poppies, Queen Eldrida, Princess Ismara and the blind ploughman) experience moments of hallucination caused by intoxicating fruits, elixirs of life and infusions of wind-flowers. Probably written in reaction to the Opium War, which facilitated the diffusion of opium-based laudanum, used for recreational purposes and health remedies, Rossetti’s ‘The Dead City’, ‘Goblin Market’ and ‘The Prince’s Progress’, as well as Ford’s The Brown Owl (1892), The Feather (1892) and The Queen Who Flew blend together parts of Oriental narratives in order to visualise the temptations of the East.