Light, Descending
Page 31
12. Which character would you most like to have dinner with? Which would you certainly not wish to sit down with?
13. The 19th century was one of tumult, with widespread revolution, war, and industrial growth. Into this mix came Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species (1859), which made many question their faith in God for the first time, as it seemed to prove that the Bible was not infallible, at least when it came to the dating of the world. Consider John Ruskin’s own spiritual path, from that of his parents’ Evangelism, to his flirtations with the Roman Catholic rite, to his admiration for his friend Norton’s Stoicism. How did the events in Ruskin’s life lead him to his self-proclaimed “paganism”, and his bouts of agnosticism? If mental illness had not claimed him, do you think Ruskin could have found spiritual peace? And in what tradition do you think that might have been?
14. In addition to being a biographical novel about a great man, this is also a novel of ideas. The most important of these is perhaps the conflict of Ruskin’s dearly held ideal of a vanished, agrarian past in which handcraft is valued, and the frenetic pace of Industrial Britain with its crowds, pollution, and exploitation. Consider this conflict (or others that strike you in the novel) and discuss how Ruskin attempted to further his goals even in the onrush of a technological age.
15. Another conflict in the novel is the idea of what constitutes “art”. Ruskin favours the young Pre-Raphaelites partly because their attention to detail, meticulous nature of their observing skills, and historic subject matter remind him of the masters of the Middle Ages. Yet he considers that Turner reigns supreme, even when that artist’s work was being derided as incomprehensible (“soap suds and white wash”); and much of Turner’s later work looks similar to the atmospheric work of Ruskin’s nemesis, James McNeil Whistler. This battle between historicism and modernity marked much of 19th century painting, sculpture, architecture, and music. How are these conflicts still playing out in 21st century culture?
16. What links the first chapter to the last?
Important paintings mentioned in Light, Descending, and where they can be viewed. (Images for most are readily available on the internet.)
Chapter One
Portrait of John Ruskin, age 3 ½, by James Northcote, R.A., Brantwood, Lancashire
Chapter Two
Juliet and Her Nurse, by JMW Turner, R.A., Private Collection
Mercury and Argus, by JMW Turner, R.A., National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
Chapter Three
Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying, by JMW Turner, R.A., Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Chapter Nine
Isabella, by John Everett Millais, R.A, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool
The Girlhood of Mary Virgin, by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Tate Britain, London
Chapter Ten
An internet search for “John Ruskin Artwork” will provide many examples of his work
The Dream of St Ursula, by Vittore Carpaccio, Galerie Dell’Accademia, Venice
Chapter Eleven
Christ in the House of His Parents, by John Everett Millais, R.A, Tate Britain, London
The Woodsman’s Daughter, by John Everett Millais, R.A, Guildhall Art Gallery, London
Chapter Twelve
The Order of Release, by John Everett Millais, R.A, Tate Gallery, London
Portrait of John Ruskin, by John Everett Millais, R.A, Private Collection
Chapter Thirteen
An internet search for “Elizabeth Siddal Artwork” will provide many examples of her work
Chapter Fourteen
The Presentation of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon, by Paolo Veronese, Galleria Sabauda, Turin
Chapter Fifteen
Val d’Aosta, by John Brett, Collection of Lord Lloyd-Webber
Chapter Twenty
The Days of Creation, by Edward Burne-Jones, A.R.A., Harvard Art Museum
Nocturne in Black and Gold, by James McNeil Whistler, Detroit Institute of Arts
Nocturne in Blue and Silver, by James McNeil Whistler, Harvard Art Museum
The Derby Day, by William Powell Frith, Tate Britain, London
Snow Storm, by JMW Turner, R.A., Tate Britain, London
Author’s Note
Why a novel about John Ruskin? In short, to take my decades-old fascination with the man and attempt to answer a few lingering questions as to his behaviour and motivations. It is only the sphere of fiction, however founded on established fact, which provides the scope for the well-reasoned imagining of the unknowable in a man’s life. In the compass of the historical novel, solutions to unanswerable questions can be proposed, and the reader in encountering these solutions and examining their ramifications may find previously opaque behaviours or personalities resolving into sharp and even indelible focus.
John Ruskin died in January 1900. Six years later Ruskin was voted the most influential author of the Labour Members of the House of Commons, his books besting even the Bible, Dickens, Carlyle, and Shakespeare. His impact on such titans as Gandhi, Tolstoy, and Proust ensured that his ideas traversed national and linguistic borders, and his influence on artists, architects, and designers enshrined him as a sort of godfather of the Arts and Crafts movement. Yet his name and legacy rapidly fell into decline as the 20th century presented its own challenges, and it is only in recent years that new biographies, exhibitions of his own paintings and drawings, and a spate of stage and film treatments (mostly, alas, centred upon his ill-fated marriage) have brought the name of John Ruskin once again before the eyes of an inquiring public eager to learn more about this exceptional, exacting, frustrating, and frustrated genius.
Ruskin’s life was so long and productive, his output so vast, and his opinions so self-contradicting that a sometimes ruthless selection of what (and in many instances, who) to include in a novel about him made for tough choices. Fine, and even exhaustive biographies of the man and his times are available, as are edited collections of letters (and he is said to have written 40,000), as well as the all-important Brantwood Diary he kept as he descended into the punishing depths of the psychosis of 1877. Along with reading at least a selection of the man’s own output and glorying in the beauty of his nature and architectural paintings these sources are a must in grasping the enormity of Ruskin’s abilities, interests, and opinions.
But my goal was to create a novel to provide readers with no prior knowledge of Ruskin a portrait of his life, times, and contemporaries that would both hew to fact and make for compelling reading. The sort of liberties I have taken, besides the numbers of interests, passions, and friends left as it were on the cutting room floor (or indicated by only the slightest of mentions) also extend to taking an exchange of letters and dramatizing them as face-to-face conversations, turning diary entries into utterances, and presuming to enter the minds of the characters. Those deeply conversant with Ruskin will be certain to notice and lament the many glosses I was forced to resort to to imbue the narrative with the energy, variety, and propulsion that a novel must, in good faith with its reader, provide. I trust these same adherents will also note the very many instances in which I have taken the great master’s words and interwoven them into the text in what I hope will be seen as a subtle enrichment of the whole.
For those wishing to plumb deeper waters, may I suggest a few of the primary and secondary sources most helpful to me in my research: The Works of John Ruskin, E.T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn, in thirty-nine volumes (George Allen, 1902-1903, London) is the sine qua non of his collected writings, but his most popular books such as Modern Painters Volume I, The Stones of Venice and The Seven Lamps of Architecture are readily available in attractive paperback versions. Praeterita, Ruskin’s autobiography (Everyman’s Library, 2005), was begun in 1885 and is suffused with beauty. The Brantwood Diary of John Ruskin, Helen Gill Viljoen, editor (Yale University Press, 1971), offers a unique perspective of a great mind teetering at the abyss of madness. The Letters of John Ruskin to Charles
Eliot Norton (Houghton Mifflin, 1904) provides insight into their abiding friendship, intellectual jousting, and painful differences. Dante Gabriel Rossetti: Family Letters Volumes I & II (Roberts Brothers, 1895) presents the personality of the poet and painter and includes a memoir by William Michael Rossetti, the artist’s brother.
Effie in Venice, edited by Mary Lutyens (John Murray, 1965), the previously unpublished letters of Effie Gray Ruskin, lifts the curtain on this vivacious and intelligent young woman during the fateful years of 1849 to 1852. Millais and the Ruskins (Vanguard, 1967) and The Ruskins and the Grays (John Murray, 1972) continue Mary Lutyens’ exhaustive and fascinating study of the involved parties. Rainy Days at Brig O’Turk (Dalrymple Press, 1983) reproduces Millais’ lively sketches from the Scottish working holiday of Summer 1853.
John Ruskin and Rose LaTouche, by Van Akin Burd (Clarendon Press, 1979) provides important background on Rose and her family, and includes Rose’s diaries of 1861 and 1867.
Of biographies of Ruskin, the following were invaluable: Tim Hilton’s John Ruskin: The Early Years (Yale University Press, 1985) and John Ruskin: The Later Years (Yale University Press, 2000); John Ruskin: A Life by John Batchelor (Carroll & Graf, 2000); John Ruskin by Frederick Kirchhoff (Twayne, 1984; and particularly useful for the insightful rendering of Ruskin’s vast written output); Ruskin: The Great Victorian by Derrick Leon (Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1949; which despite factual errors and the overt worship of its subject, draws on valuable Leon family source material). Quentin Bell’s Ruskin (Hogarth Press, 1963) is a short and piquant study, full of interest.
Other more specialised works on Ruskin from which I profited include Ruskin’s God, by Michael Wheeler (Cambridge University 1999); Ruskin and Oxford, by Robert Hewison (Clarendon Press, 1996): Ruskin and Turner, by Luke Herrmann (Faber and Faber, 1968); and John Ruskin: A Life in Pictures, by James S. Dearden (Sheffield Academic Press, 1999).
Moral Desperado: The Life of Thomas Carlyle, by Simon Heffer (Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1995) and Fred Kaplan's Thomas Carlyle: A Biography (Cornell University, 1983) provided the background I sought on the Sage of Chelsea, and the reading of Carlyle’s Sartor Resartus proved an unexpected delight.
The Legend of Elizabeth Siddal by Jan Marsh (Quartet, 1989) examines that doomed painter and poet both as icon and artist, and the same scholar’s The Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood (Quartet, 1985) places Lizzie in context with the other “stunners”- talented artists and craftswomen, all.
Linda Merrill’s highly readable A Pot of Paint: Aesthetics on Trial in Whistler v. Ruskin (Smithsonian, 1992) reconstructs the trial from scores of newspaper, magazine, and eye-witness accounts (as the verdict was not appealed, the court records were destroyed) and was the source for the chapter on the Whistler libel trial.
Finally, a few words of thanks. I am beholden to the many skilled and professional librarians who assisted me in my research, particularly those of The British Library; Houghton Library, Harvard; Margaret Clapp Library, Wellesley College; and The Cambridge Historical Society, Cambridge, Massachusetts. I am sincerely grateful to the administration and staff of the MacDowell Colony, Ledig House International, and Byrdcliffe for granting me residencies during which a substantial portion of this novel was written and revised. The peace, quiet, and natural beauty provided by these artists’ retreats made it possible for me to harness five years of research and planning and produce the novel in staccato bursts of energy. My appreciation for my wonderful First Readers Jen Calder (truly a never-failing source of support and encouragement over six years’ duration), James English, and Jennifer Joyce is unbounded.
If you have enjoyed Light, Descending, I hope you will consider leaving a review at Kobo.com. Reader reviews are the best way new readers find great books. Thank you so much.
Also by Octavia Randolph:
The Circle of Ceridwen Saga:
The Circle of Ceridwen: Book One
Ceridwen of Kilton: Book Two
The Claiming: Book Three
The Hall of Tyr: Book Four
Tindr: Book Five
Silver Hammer, Golden Cross: Book Six
The Tale of Melkorka: A Novella
Ride: A Novella: The Story of Lady Godiva
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