John Ruskin

Mark Andrew Frost (University of Portsmouth)
Download PDF Add to Bookshelf Report an Error

Regarded by many of his peers as the foremost intellectual and aesthetic essayist of the Victorian period, John Ruskin's profile during his lifetime was matched only by the decline in his reputation in the years following his death. Ruskin's fame as an art critic began with

Modern Painters

(1843-60, 5 vols.), a defence of J. M. W. Turner that grew into a much more wide-ranging study of aesthetics and nature. Once established in public life, he pursued an extraordinarily varied and productive career, writing on architecture, sculpture, religion, geology, botany, ornithology, history, and mythology; and thrusting himself into contemporary debates on aesthetics, science, religion and politics. Dogged by mental illhealth and unhappiness, Ruskin's final decade was largely silent, but he left…

3155 words

Citation: Frost, Mark Andrew. "John Ruskin". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 14 June 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=3890, accessed 19 March 2024.]

3890 John Ruskin 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

Save this article

If you need to create a new bookshelf to save this article in, please make sure that you are logged in, then go to your 'Account' here

Leave Feedback

The Literary Encyclopedia is a living community of scholars. We welcome comments which will help us improve.