Feminism in 'Goblin Market'

Goblin Market's main theme is feminism because of all the clear and not-so clear references to feminism and general female 'sisterhood'.

There are many references to female closeness in the poem, for example, on line 36, Lizzie and Laura are described as "crouching close together". In the context they are doing this to protect themselves from the Goblin Men, so it creates the idea that when women are close, they can protect each other.
 Also, the Goblin Men are linked with having closeness themsleves as they are described as, "Brother with sly Brother". In this context, though, the connection with each goblin man seems to be of a more negative aspect, particularly as the word 'sly' can be synonimous with 'mischeivous' or 'sneaky'.

Another main theme within Goblin Market, which links greatly to feminism, is the evilness of men. This is a quite obvious theme as when considering the characters in the poem, the evil and temptatious characters are men and the "fair" and "kind hearted" characters are women. The Goblin Men are also described as carrying "evil gifts" which also places a negative prefix on them.