INTRODUCTION TO VOL. XII

IN this volume are collected various Lectures, Reviews, Pamphlets, Letters, and other Papers, written or published between the years 1844 and 1854-that is, during the period in Ruskin’s literary life, of which the principal works were The Seven Lamps of Architecture and The Stones of Venice. The volume may be said from this point of view to be a collection of occasional works undertaken by the way and on what he afterwards called “the old road.” It contains, indeed, a great part of the first volume of the collection of miscellanies, to which Ruskin gave that title on its publication in 1885. But to these miscellanies there is here added a larger production of the same period, the Lectures on Architecture and Painting. The volume is divided into four parts. The first contains these Lectures (delivered 1853, published 1854), to which precedence is given on account of their more considerable scale, and for another reason presently to be stated. The second Part contains seven pieces (or collection of pieces) on subjects connected with Art; and to these is added in an appendix some supplementary and illustrative matter. The third Part contains Ruskin’s principal excursus in the field of theological and ecclesiastical controversy-the Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds-to which again is added, in an appendix, additional and related matter which hitherto has either not been printed or printed only for private circulation. The fourth Part contains some letters which Ruskin intended for the Times, and which are of interest as his first words expressly on political and economic subjects. This arrangement of the volume and the collection of these scattered papers bring out in a striking manner the many-sided nature of his interests. Even so, one not unimportant piece of work-Giotto and his Works in Padua-is omitted. This, however, was published in parts, and though begun in 1853-1854, was not finished till 1860. It is therefore reserved for a later volume. For the most part the themes dealt with in the present volume, and the author’s manner of treatment, are similar to those of his earlier works. There are Reviews of books which cover periods or aspects of art already noticed

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[Version 0.04: March 2008]