Rossetti's
Proserpine depicts the Roman goddess
Proserpina who lives in the underworld during winter. In
Roman mythology,
Proserpina, daughter of
Jupiter and
Ceres, was carried off to the
Underworld (
Hades) by
Pluto, who married her despite her love for
Adonis. When Ceres begged Jupiter to return her daughter to the earth, he agreed, on condition that Proserpine had not eaten any fruits in Hades. As Proserpine had eaten six pomegranate seeds, it was decreed that she should remain in Hades for six months of the year and be allowed on the earth for the other six. Rossetti inscribed the date 1874 on the picture, but he worked for seven years on eight different canvases of the same subject. The model for Prosperine,
Jane Morris, was a friend of Rossetti and the wife of his Pre-Rapahaelite colleague
William Morris. She was known for her delicate facial features, slender hands, pale skin, and thick raven hair. Rossetti painted the work at a time when his mental health was precarious and his love for Jane Morris was obsessive. Rossetti wrote about
Proserpine, She is represented in a gloomy corridor of her palace, with the fatal fruit in her hand. As she passes, a gleam strikes on the wall behind her from some inlet suddenly opened, and admitting for a moment the sight of the
upper world; and she glances furtively towards it, immersed in thought. The incense-burner stands beside her as the attribute of a goddess. The ivy branch in the background may be taken as a symbol of clinging memory. Unable to decide as a young man whether to concentrate on painting or poetry, Rossetti incorporated his own interpretation of poetic and literary sources into the work. Rossetti composed a sonnet to accompany this work that focuses on the theme of longing (see
sonnet below) and may allude to a yearning to seduce Jane from her unhappy marriage with
William Morris. Proserpine had been imprisoned in Pluto's underground realm for tasting the forbidden pomegranate. Jane, trapped by convention, was also tasting forbidden fruit. There is a deeper meaning in the painting as Rossetti stayed with Jane at
Kelmscott Manor during the summer months each year and in winter she returned to stay with William Morris, thus paralleling Proserpine's freedom during summer. The symbolism in Rossetti's painting indicates Proserpine's plight, as well as Jane Morris's plight, torn between her husband, the father of her two adored daughters, and her lover. The pomegranate draws the viewer's eye, the colour of its flesh matching the colour of Proserpine's full lips. The ivy behind her, as Rossetti stated, represents clinging memory and the passing of time; the shadow on the wall is her time in
Hades, the patch of sunlight, her glimpse of earth. Her dress, like spilling water, suggests the turning of the tides, and the incense burner denotes the subject as an immortal. Proserpine's saddened eyes, which are the same cold blue color as most of the painting, indirectly stare at the
other realm. ==The inscribed sonnet==