John Ruskin: The Portrait Of A Prophet By Peter Quennell

The object of this book is to portray John Ruskin both as a writer and as a personality: to show the lose connection between his development: and to personal growth and his literary development: and to suggest how the frustration of his private hopes finally brought to an end his career of public usefulness. The theme is vast. Ruskin was an ordinarily copious writer and an industrious correspondent; and his Collected Works in the massive Library Edition, including his Letters, run to thirty-nine volumes. The present study does not pretend to give a detailed account of Ruskin in all his numerous phases. His opinions as an art-critic themselves demand a separate essay: his efforts and influence as a social reformer deserve far more intensive examination than I have sought to give them. The student who wishes a closer view must fall back on the admirably thorough-going biographies produced by Cook and Collingwood. But, since the appearance of those pious and affectionate tributes, certain new material has been put before the general reader