Although Whistler's painting was widely noticed, he was upstaged by Manet's more shocking painting "Le déjeuner sur l'herbe". The controversy surrounding the paintings was described in Émile Zola's novel "L'Œuvre" (1886). The reception Whistler's painting received was mostly favourable, however, and largely vindicated him after the rejection he had experienced both in London and in Paris. The painting was greatly admired by his colleagues and friends Manet, the painter Gustave Courbet and the poet Charles Baudelaire. The art critic Théophile Thoré-Bürger saw it in the tradition of Goya and Velázquez. There were, however, those who were less favourable; certain French critics saw the English Pre-Raphaelite trend as somewhat eccentric.