Little Holland House Album, a compilation by Edward Burne-Jones with a contemporary photograph (sepia as shown) of his drawing entitled King's Daughters inserted into the album's binding. The album is a home-made collection of "a torrent of poems" from admired sources (Todd 66), which he illustrated in pen and ink on vellum while convalescing from illness at Little Holland House with the Pattle sisters and G.F. Watts in Kensington (see Bell 21). Although Burne-Jones was engaged to his future wife Georgiana by then, she was away at the time with her family in Manchester, and he become positively infatuated with Sophia Dalrymple (née Pattle) during his stay - despite the fact that Sophia herself was married. It was a strange, dreamy period. Strongly influenced by D.G. Rossetti's personality and immersion in the medieval past, "we lived more or less in a world of dreams,” said Val Prinsep of those weeks (66). As for Burne-Jones himself, "Ned’s imaginative life had always been rich and there was an exquisite pleasure to be found in this forbidden unrequited unfulfilled and unsatisfactory love," adds Janet Todd, commenting on the "loose, amorous atmosphere about the house" (66, 68).
Georgiana Burne-Jones would paint an idyllic picture of this part of her husband's life, in retrospect at least generously forgiving him for his dalliance:
I could not realize then as I do now what this visit to Little Holland House must have been to him. There, for the first time, he found himself surrounded without any effort of his own by beauty in ordinary life; and no day passed without awakening some admiration or enthusiasm. He had never gone short of love and loving care, but for visible beauty he had literally starved through all his early years. The lovely garden that surrounded the house was an enchanted circle separating it from other places: there in the summertime, and especially on Sundays, came most people of note in the different circles that made up the “world” of England — old and young, rich and poor, each welcome for some reason recognized by the hostess. Part of the great lawn was given up to croquet — the chief outdoor game of the time — and another to bowls, whilst elsewhere encampments could be seen of those who did not play; and all seemed happy. The very strawberries that stood in little crimson hills upon the tables were larger and riper than others. [183]
Opening the "torrent" of poems and highly evocative drawings in the Little Holland House Album is the figure of "Amor" from the ending of Dante's Divine Comedy. Then, along with a number of blank pages indicating that the album was never completed, comes a medley of works by Burne-Jones's hero at that time, Rossetti ("My Father's Close," together with bars of music; "The Blessed Damozel"; and "The Card Dealer"), and five additional works: Browning's "Rudel to the Lady of Tripoli"; Tennyson's "The Wise and Foolish Virgins" from "Guinivere" in Idylls of the King; Poe's "The Haunted Palace"; Keats's "La Belle Dame Sans Merci"; and the traditional ballad, "Sir Patrick Spens," in Sir Walter Scott's version of it. Taken together, the material brilliantly evokes not only this phase of Burne-Jone's life, but the very spirit of the time.
The compilation is usefully presented in the online Burne-Jones Catalogue Raisonné, and is on show at the Watts Gallery, Compton in Surrey, at the time of writing (until 4 May 2026).
Links to Related Material
- Little Holland House
- G.F. Watts's portrait of Sophia Dalrymple (1851-53)
- Women of Influence: The Pattle Sisters, A Curator's Perspective (Watts Gallery, Compton)
Bibliography
Bell, Malcolm. Sir Edward Burne-Jones: A Record and Review. London: George Bell & Sons, 1910. Internet Archive, from a copy in the University of California Libraries. Web. 18 December 2025.
Burne-Jones, Georgiana. Edward Burne-Jones: Memorials of a Life. London: Macmillan, 1906 (2 vol. ed). Internet Archive. Web. 18 December 2o25.
Christian, John. Introduction. Little Holland House Album. North Berwick: Dalrymple Press, 1981.
Dakers, Caroline. The Holland Park Circle. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1999.
"The Little Holland House Album 1859, poems by D.G. Rossetti, Browning, Tennyson, Edgar Allen Poe, Keats and Sir Patrick Spens." Burne-Jones Catalogue Raisonné. Web. 18 December 2025.
Todd, Pamela. Pre-Raphaelites at Home. New York: Watson-Guptill, 2001.
Created 18 December 2025