'The
Lady of
Shalott'
is one of
the best
known paintings
by J.W.
Waterhouse.
It was inspired
by the poem
written
by Lord
Alfred Tennyson
in his early
20's. Though
the poem's
tale is
reminiscent
of Elaine
of Astolat,
who died
of a broken
heart for
her love
of Sir Lancelot,
Tennyson's
mythology
is his own,
inspired
by an Arthurian
tale written
during the
Italian
Renaissance.
The Lady
of Shalott
lives in
a tower,
subject
to a curse
from which
she is fated
to view
the world
beyond only
in a mirror,
then to
weave her
visons into
a tapestry.
On the day
she sees
Sir Lancelot
riding over
the hills
below, she
turns to
gaze directly
at him,
and in that
moment,
the mirror
cracks and
her impending
doom is
ordained.
She leaves
her tower
and boards
a boat that
will carry
her downstream
to Camelot
and to her
beloved
knight,
but death
claims her
along the
way.
The similarly
tragic tale
of Elaine
of Astolat
is told
in Thomas
Mallory's
Morte d'Arthur
and in TH
White's
The Once
and Future
King.
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