“The Venus of this picture is no Aphrodite, fresh and white and jubilant from the foam of Italian seas, nor is she Love incarnate or human passion; but she is a queen of Love who loves not herself, a desire that is insatiable and remorseless, absolute, supreme... She is the Lust of the Flesh that perisheth not, though around her loves and lives and dreams are evermore becoming as nought.” — William Sharp, Dante Gabriel Rossetti: A Record and a Study, 204-207.
