A Love Story, by Sir Frank Dicksee (1853–1928). 1882. Oil on canvas. 41½ by 59½ inches (105.4 by 151.1 cm). Private collection, image courtesy of Sotheby's, London.
Dicksee exhibited A Love Story, also known as Love's Whisper, at the Royal Academy in 1882, no. 290. It was later shown at the Jubilee Exhibition at the Manchester Art Gallery in 1887, no. 926, lent by its then-owner Stephen Holland. The painting's title was accompanied in the Royal Academy catalogue by the following lines of Tennyson's poem "The Gardener's Daughter":
"In whispers, like the whispers of the leaves,
That tremble round a nightingale."
The painting features a young couple in mediaeval costume seated on a marble bench in a garden. The beautiful maiden is dressed in a white gown, her eyes downcast, and her hands clasped together. Her lover is dressed in purple and gazing intently at her. His hands are clasped around his left knee. The time is evening with moonlight very effectively shown illuminating the young woman's gown.
When A Love Story sold at Sotheby's in 2024 one of their experts pointed out that: "Painted only four years after the success of Harmony - and very much its counterpoint in terms of the depiction of reciprocal rather than unrequited love - A Love Story was another triumph of emotional pathos set in a pseudo-Medieval world. It neatly fits between Harmony and Romeo and Juliet of 1884." Sotheby's also pointed out that A Love Story is indebted to the set of gouaches Dicksee begun in 1881 for Romeo and Juliet for the publishers Cassell's:
None of the compositions of the illustrations relate specifically to A Love Story but the emotional intensity of them is very alike. There are literal borrowings from the Romeo and Juliet gouaches, such as the marble bench with its scrolled-arm which appears in the illustration depicting Romeo receiving the invitation to the ball and the laurel tree which appears in the balcony scene. The man's hose (striped down one leg) seen in the present picture, is worn by Mercutio in two of the gouaches and by Paris in another…. Whilst the painting could be connected to depictions of the clandestine trysts of Paolo and Francesca, Romeo and Juliet and Lancelot and Guinevere, Dicksee chose to title his painting A Love Story and not make any definite connection to a specific romance."
An etching of this subject by Adolph Lalauze after Dicksee was offered for sale by Thomas Agnew & Sons.
Contemporary Reviews of the Painting
The painting was well reviewed when it was shown at the Royal Academy in 1882. The critic of The Art Journal considered it one of the best pictures exhibited despite being a moonlight scene: "An arched canvas; mediaeval Italian lovers upon a marble seat in the moonlight. Moonlight pictures are generally unsatisfactory, and in some ways this is no exception to the rule, but the drawing is so good, and the execution so thorough and careful, that it deserves to be named among the remarkable pictures of the year" (210). F. G. Stephens in The Athenaeum found it a good example of decorative painting and particularly admired Dicksee's depiction of moonlight:
Splendidly effective in its way, a way which is somewhat like that of a spectacle and entirely decorative, is the very attractive picture by Mr. Dicksee called A Love Story (290). The figures of the two lovers, sitting in moonlight shadows among laurels, are half revealed by light direct and reflected, half hidden in the shadows of the foliage. Mr. Dicksee, who is a faithful admirer of the graceful genius of Sir Frederic Leighton, has been more than usually fortunate on this occasion in his imitation of his model. The lady is listening with clasped hands to the ardent tale of her companion, who claps his knee while he leans sideways to whisper in her ear. The design is pre-eminently fit for a decoration, but we should have preferred a less taking effect, and somewhat less of sweet grace in the expressions, attitudes, and general treatment of a very agreeable but not at all masculine picture. The representation of moonlight is so entirely spectacular that is sure to attract the public. [608]
The East Anglian Daily Times praised it: "A Love Story, by Frank Dicksee, is one of the notable pictures of the exhibition – Florentine lovers sitting in the moonlight, among deep shadows, on an old stone bench, the light striking portions of the drapery of the girl, and rendering it stone, like the seat. There are subtle beauties and harmonies in this work, which place its author on a high pinnacle of fame" (3). A critic for Surrey Independent and Wimbledon Mercury praised its colour in particular: "There are few finer pictures in the Academy than Mr. Frank Dicksee's A Love Story. It is moonlit evening in some Italian garden, where, upon a stone seat surrounded by sweetly-whispering laurels, two lovers sit rapt in the highest bliss that youth can know. The depth and richness of the colour is remarkable, yet nothing seems to have been sacrificed to it. There is no harsh tone, but all subdued and reserved yet forcible. Notice how the rich dress of the lady falls in gracious folds, how the stone seat is made to contrast on the one hand with the dress, and on the other with the laurels, and then consider the moonlight effect of the whole picture. It gives hopes but Mr. Frank Dicksee will become the greatest colourist of his day" (7).
A reviewer for the Pall Mall Gazette praised both the sentiment and the artistry: "Mr. Frank Dicksee's Love Story will be, and will deserve to be, one of the most popular pictures of the year. The lovers who whisper together in the shadow of the ancient architecture, the broad planes of stonework in the moonlight, the depth of silent foliage, all interpenetrated with music and passion, form a whole which is not more lovely in sentiment than it is complete and accomplished in workmanship" (4). The Illustrated London News preferred his earlier works, however: "Frank Dicksee's picture (290) of a young Italian whispering to his lady-love in a garden seat shaded by laurels is an artistic exercitation on moonlight effect, but we prefer the less honeyed and more robust and pathetic sentiment and meaning of earlier works" (406). The Magazine of Art, on the other hand, felt just the opposite: "Mr. Frank Dicksee, on the other hand, has made a good advance on his former efforts, and in A Love Story exhibits the strongest work that has come from his hand" (352).
Sydney Hodges in The Magazine of Art, in reviewing Dicksee's early career, noted: "The succeeding year [1882], Mr. Dicksee exhibited what is perhaps the most purely poetical of all his works, A Love Story…. This picture is so well known, by means of the engraving published by Agnew, that it hardly needs description, except to say that in beauty of conception and skilful work, especially in the tender rendering of moonlight, it fully maintained the reputation of the painter" (219).
Bibliography
19th Century European Paintings & Sculpture. New York: Sotheby's (2 February 2024): lot 833. https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2024/19th-century-european-paintings-sculpture/a-love-story
Blackburn, Henry. Academy Notes. VIII. London: Chatto and Windus, (May 1882): 31.
"The Exhibition of the Royal Academy." The Art Journal New Series XXI (1882): 210-12.
"The Exhibitions." The Magazine of Art V (1882): 351-52.
Hodges, Sidney. "Mr. Frank Dicksee, A.R.A." The Magazine of Art. 10 (November 1886-October 1887): 217-22. Internet Archive. Web. 21 October 2014.
"The Royal Academy Exhibition." East Anglian Daily Times (29 April 1882): 3.
"The Royal Academy Exhibition." The Illustrated London News LXXX (29 April 1882): 406.
"The Royal Academy Exhibition." Pall Mall Gazette (2 May 1882): 4.
"The Royal Academy Exhibition." Surrey Independent and Wimbledon Mercury (6 May 1882): 7.
Stephens, Frederic George. "Fine Arts. The Royal Academy." The Athenaeum No. 2846 (13 May 1882): 607-09.
Toll, Simon. Frank Dicksee 1853-1928, His Art and Life..Woodbridge, 2016, cat. no. FD.1882.1, 55-56 & 226.
Created 21 October 2014
Last modified 10 July 2026