3544. John Ruskin to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 21, 134–136.
[London]
Saturday,—6th April. [1855] [1]
Dear Mrs Browning.
It is not often that I have time to set myself quietly to a letter to any one I care about– It seems to be a law of nature that the more leisure people have, the less they know how to use it, and although I am my own master from dawn to sunset—nominally, I find that time & the hour [2] get the mastery of me in the end. However, whether I can now write down the half of what I have to say, or not, does not so much matter as that I should tell you how thankful I was to get your letter and to know that you were not seriously ill, and to know also that my line had given so much pleasure to your husband. For I know that I shall to day—give him more—in the more confirmed assurance of the good I have had from reading your books lately.
I don’t say pleasure—for that is the least of it. One may have much pleasure in verses which merely serve to amuse the hour– But I have had good. My work—and my fortune—such as they have been—have made me harder than I like to be; and every day I find myself more & more dried & stiff– I hope not—in reality—worse than I was—but very much what a raisin is to a grape—(a raisin with the bloom off) and your poems make me feel fresh again—they are just like what I suppose the dew & honey are, mixed—when the bees are out early in the bottoms of the cupshaped flowers; & coming out of one[’]s daily work to them is just like leaving a room full of gaslights & ugly people, and plunging into the spray of a hill cascade—& lying down to sleep among the Alpine roses. I used to think—when I knew no better, that you were mystical & forced– I always admired you a great deal—still I thought something was sickly in the tone– I did not think you were really great. But you are; and I know it, now: Only there are one or two things I want to talk to you about.
Whenever I find anybody who is verily great—and there are not many people whom I put into that circle—I am always ready to believe in them, to almost any extent. I would accept them, faults and all—reverently, thinking that their faults are a part of them and may have some secret connection with what is best in them—inseparably. So that in general I should hold it an impertinence absolutely to pronounce that they were faults. In art I can say positively—that is true—or that is false—and there can be no mistake in praise or blame. But in poetry, the expression which seems to me now imperfect or objectionable might possibly—if I could only raise myself quite to the writer[’]s level—be the only right or clear one to me .. and—whether it would be so or not—still it is interesting as a fact that the good writer did like that, & feel in it what I cannot feel.
A writer must be very powerful to obtain entire carte blanche & submission of this kind—but I should almost give it to you—except only in this respect. That assuredly you ought to consider with yourself—not merely how the poetry may be made absolutely as good as possible, but how also it may be put into a form which shall do as much good as possible, and if an expression—though really a good one, be such as to startle away a large number of careless readers, who otherwise might gradually have become careful ones, I think, unless there be very strong justification for it, you would agree with me in thinking it right to cancel that expression. For instance the “nympholeptic”—in the lost bower:– [3] I don’t, myself, know what it means—and I have’nt had time to look in the dictionary for it—and what is still worse—I don’t expect to find it, when I do look. I mean to mark things of this kind—there are not many—but all those which I feel painful I will mark– I do not know if your friends usually can feel such faults—for I suppose you generally find the world divide into those who can’t understand a single syllable of you—and those who think you cannot do wrong. I should be much disposed to join the last group—& fling my cap up for you—write as you would—but my business is to be a critic—and I find it goes against my conscience to be in this matter—unprofessional– For truly—I want these books of yours to be estimated as they deserve, and I know that some of these phrases are heavy impediments.
Among various works I have in hand at present—one is the endeavour to revive the art of Illumination. [4] And the day before yesterday, I made my best workman, who has recovered thoroughly the art of laying on the gold, copy out the beginning of the Catarina to Camoens, which—on the whole—is my favourite—and which I mean to make one of the most glorious little burning books that ever had leaf turned by white finger– I intended to have begun with a canto of Dante—but afterwards I thought it would be of better omen to choose an English poet—and finally I chose this. I shall put one stanza in each vellum page—with deep blue & purple & golden embroidery—but I am afraid—(I ought rather to say—I hope,) it will not be finished before you come to England. After that, I think I like the drama of exile best—(all but the first stanza of it.) [5] I don’t say it is finer than Milton—but I like it better—it seems to me far more true, that is—Milton was writing a poem to introduce as much learning & picturesque thought as he could—not believing that his angels ever did what he says they did. But you believe in your angels—and are, I am certain, much nearer the verity of them than Milton–
I find I can’t write any more to day—so I must just send this, & go on when I can– My best regards to your husband
Ever faithfully yours,
J Ruskin.
My father & mother [6] beg their compliments. My mother says, if you would when you write—tell her something about your child, it would greatly gratify her.
Address, on integral page: Affranchie / Mrs Robert Browning / Poste Restante / Florence / Italy.
Publication: Cook, pp. 195–198.
Manuscript: Berg Collection.
1. Year provided by postmark.
2. Cf. Macbeth, I, 3, 147.
3. EBB, “The Lost Bower,” (1844), line 208.
4. Towards the end of 1854, Ruskin delivered a series of informal talks at the Architectural Museum, London, on “Decorative Colour as applicable to Architectural and other Purposes,” a large part of which concerned the art of illumination. Evidently, Ruskin did not seriously pursue his mission for its revival, but, according to Evelyn J. Phimister, he influenced and encouraged William Morris’s life-long interest. Morris’s “earliest example is his illumination for two stanzas of the song from Robert Browning’s ‘Paracelsus,’ which he presented to Elizabeth and Robert Browning during their visit to England in the summer of 1856” (“John Ruskin, William Morris, and the Illuminated Manuscript,” The Journal of William Morris Studies, 14, Autumn 2000, 32). Morris’s illuminations for Paracelsus sold as lot 945 in Browning Collections (see Reconstruction, A1680).
6. Margaret Ruskin (née Cock, changed to Cox, 1781–1871) and John James Ruskin (1785–1864), a successful sherry importer in London.
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