W.M. Rossetti As Reluctant Biographer: The Genesis of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, His Family Letters, With a Memoir‪.‬

Watts-Dunton's eagerly awaited but never written biography of Dante Gabriel Rossetti was to have been part of a Life and Letters volume, with the letters edited by Rossetti's brother William. Williams part in the project was ready for publication in 1883, but for twelve years Watts-Dunton delayed producing the biography, despite frequent prodding from William, who was reluctant to write the biography himself. His biography of Shelley, edition of Whitman, and defence of Swinburne had made William acutely conscious of the pitfalls and frustrations that a biographer of Rossetti would have to endure. The strengths and weaknesses of the biography that William eventually produced were the product of his family loyalty, civil servant's sense of what in late Victorian England it was practicable to reveal, and personal disinclination to gloss over the darker side of his brother's personality. **********