Amoret in the Garden of Adonis exemplifies Pre-Raphaelitism, a movement that arose in 1848 in Great Britain as a reaction against the dark-toned, anecdotal paintings typical of late Romanticism, a dominant style of the period. Pre-Raphaelite painting is characterized by an obsessive pursuit of "truth to nature" and a preoccupation with moral subjects. Batten's Pre-Raphaelite technique, utilizes thin glazes of brilliant color, brushed over a reflective white ground to create intense, even illumination. He is attempting to suggest dazzling natural daylight, a challenge to late 19th-century painters of many schools.

The subject was drawn from Edmund Spenser's 16th-century epic poem, The Faerie Queen. The scene depicts trouble in paradise. Raised in the Garden of Adonis, itself a symbol of the cyclical fertility of nature, Amoret represents the ideal of marriageable womanhood. Father Time, enemy of youth and beauty, periodically scythes down the luxurious gardens. Amoret holds red and white roses, symbolic of passion and purity, Happily in the poem the magical gardens revive, and Amoret is united with her true love, the knight Scudamore.