Paolo and Francesca in four paintings: Dante's doomed lovers

One kiss over a book, one sword, one eternity in the wind. How four painters from 1820 to 1905 told the most famous love story in Dante's Inferno.

Paolo embracing and kissing Francesca, who sits in a pale satin gown, in a dim room with a lectern and green curtain, while a man with a drawn sword approaches from the shadows; painted by Pierre Claude François Delorme.

Francesca da Polenta was married for political reasons to Giovanni Malatesta of Rimini. She fell in love with his younger brother Paolo, and when Giovanni found them together he killed them both. Dante met them in the second circle of hell, blown for ever on a dark wind with the other lovers, and gave Francesca the most famous lines in the Inferno: they were reading of Lancelot and Guinevere, and at the lovers' kiss 'that day we read no further.' For the nineteenth century there was no greater love story. These four paintings tell it from the first kiss to the eternal wind.

1. Paolo and Francesca

Pierre Claude François Delorme — Paolo and Francesca, 1820. Complete composition.

Delorme paints the instant Dante describes: Paolo has pulled Francesca to him and the reading is forgotten. The room is almost dark, lit from the right where her white satin catches the light. Look into the shadow on the left and the end of the story is already there: her husband, sword drawn, stepping in.

The whole tragedy in one frame, kiss and sword together: the version to choose if you want the story told in full.

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2. Paolo and Francesca

Paolo in a pale doublet leaning towards Francesca, who sits in a golden gown on a carved Gothic bench, in a chamber with patterned dark walls; painted by Cosroe Dusi.

Cosroe Dusi — Paolo and Francesca, c. 1831. Complete composition.

Cosroe Dusi sets the scene a moment earlier, in a tall Gothic chamber of carved furniture and patterned walls. The two sit side by side on a bench, Paolo leaning in to speak to her, Francesca in a gown of gold brocade, still composed. Nothing has happened yet, which is exactly what makes it tense.

Elegant and restrained, with fine Gothic detail: a quieter picture that rewards a close look.

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3. Paolo and Francesca

Paolo and Francesca, pale and wrapped together in a grey drapery, drifting through a dark brown void, her eyes closed and his arms around her; painted by George Frederic Watts.

George Frederic Watts — Paolo and Francesca, 1870. Watts Gallery. Complete composition.

George Frederic Watts paints them where Dante found them, in hell. There is no room, no book and no husband: only the two lovers, pale and wrapped together, carried through a brown and endless dark. Francesca's eyes are closed; Paolo holds her as if he will never let go, and never can.

Haunting and dreamlike, in soft greys and browns: a Symbolist masterpiece for a reflective wall.

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4. Paolo and Francesca

Two tall figures, Paolo and Francesca, in dark and green cloaks with pale headcloths, pressed together in a dark wind with small flames below; painted by Harald Slott-Møller.

Harald Slott-Møller — Paolo and Francesca, 1905. Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen. Complete composition.

The Danish painter Harald Slott-Møller painted the lovers in 1905 as two tall figures in the wind of hell, wrapped in dark and green cloaks, heads together, with small flames licking at the bottom of the picture. It is spare, cold and strangely tender, a Nordic take on the Italian story.

Tall, narrow and graphic: it holds a slim wall or a stair beautifully.

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Two moments, then: the kiss in the room and the wind in the dark. The Romantics of the 1820s and 1830s chose the kiss; Watts and the Symbolists chose the wind. All four paintings hang in the Love Stories collection, printed whole, with the rest of literature's great lovers around them.

Walk through the Love Stories room · The Love Stories collection