In an Artist's Studio

One face looks out from all his canvases,

-Personification of face .The sonnet starts by focusing on a face, one that stares out at the speaker
from a portrait painted on canvas. This artist is the subject of his own art -> “looks out from all
his canvases”.
One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans:
-As the speaker scans the room, “we” notice that all she sees are portraits of the same person,
sitting, walking, leaning, repeated ad nauseam.

We found her hidden just behind those screens,

- While searching for the repeating female figure, the speaker finds her “hidden” throughout
different canvases.

That mirror gave back all her loveliness.

-Mention of a mirror: she is presented as an idealized woman (inmobile and lovely).

A queen in opal or in ruby dress,

-By calling her ”Queen”-> metaphor. The speaker emphasizes the idea that the artist is able to
paint her in different ways, in this case like royalty or nameless girl (stereotypes of the
Victorian woman)
A nameless girl in freshest summer-greens,
-”Nameless girl”-> metaphor (prostitute)

A saint, an angel — every canvas means

-”Saint”-> metaphor, ”Angel”-> metaphor -> Women have been portrayed through literature either
as angels or whores. However, the speaker loves her in all her forms, he is obsessed with her.

The same one meaning, neither more or less.

-He would love her in whatever form she took.

The artist’s model is made to perform all these roles as she sits for the male artist’s pictures. But all
of these different roles mean essentially the same thing: they are a version of the male
objectification of women, men’s need to possess and control the way women are represented and,
through this, the way women should be.

He feeds upon her face by day and night,

-Artist as predator or parasite -> "Feeds upon her face" suggests that the artist obtains a form of
satisfaction or nourishment from looking at the image of the woman he adores, however it is an
example of hyperbole.

-The odd mention of ‘night’ suggesting some sort of male monster or demon, like an incubus,
which visits women at night and feeds upon their bodies and souls.

And she with true kind eyes looks back on him,

-”True kind eyes”-> synecdoche.”Looks back on him”-> personification of mirror. The girl is a victim.
Why “on” him and not “at” him? Because the woman is not conceived as a person in her own right,
merely a reflection of what the man wants to find.

Fair as the moon and joyful as the light:

-”Fair as the moon” and ”Joyful as the light”-> simile. Show her passive and submissive. The moon is
a feminine symbol. Always has to be happy.

Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim;

-She cannot look sad or tired. Dim connected with bright in the next line (always has to ramin like
that for the man to enjoy her).

Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright;

Not as she is, but as she fills his dream.

-She cannot be who she really is, but the one his husband expects. Fills-> she is a sexual possesion,
subordinated to the man.

Rossetti shows her readers just how far women were censored by society. The freedom
of expression, another facet of identity, was not something men wanted to see in the
Victorian lady. As a result, they ignored these feelings altogether and instead, forced a
mask of blissful happiness on women