A longdrawn carol, mournful, holy,
She chanted loudly, chanted lowly,
Till her eyes were darken’d wholly,
And her smooth face sharpen’d slowly,
Turn’d to tower’d Camelot:
For ere she reach’d upon the tide
The first house by the water-side,
Singing in her song she died,
The Lady of Shalott.
excerpt – Tennyson, 1832
John William Waterhouse painted nine subjects considering different Tennysonian themes and poems as well as three different versions of The Lady of Shalott. Waterhouse’s ‘Lady of Shalott’ exhibited throughout three different years: summer exhibition in 1888, 1894 along with once more in 1916. Every exhibition would focus on a unique aspect of the artwork and excerpts of the poem were involved in the catalogue. In 1888, The Royal Academy deemed Waterhouse an accommodation for his painting, ‘The Lady of Shalott.’ The original size is 153 x 200 cm, located at Tate Britian.
