John Ruskin was born in London in 1819, the only son of a successful Scottish sherry merchant. His father encouraged him to take up painting and poetry; his mother hoped that he might be a minister. He was educated at home and at Christ Church, Oxford, where he was profoundly influenced by the evolutionary sciences of the day, especially geology. At the same time, Ruskin started to write about art and architecture, and began a lifelong advocacy of the work of Turner. As a result, he became an inspiration to a generation of younger artists, most notably the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Biography Associated with John Ruskin (q.v.); son of Joseph Severn, a painter and friend of the poet John Keats (q.v.), and brother of Ann Mary Severn (q.v.), a popular portrait painter. What makes these accusations the more disquieting is the fact that, when the arguments and evidence offered by Robson and Hilton 5 in support of the contention that Ruskin was a pedophile are examined, we find little justification given for the designation and scant evidence presented to confirm the charge—especially in Robson’s case. Ruskin spent much of the following year (1873) at Brantwood, interspersed with lectures at Oxford. * From the car park there are entrances to the upper gardens and on the other side of the road to the harbour walk . We have designed two routes into the upper gardens, on the one hand is the Ruskin route – a steeper route beginning from the zig-zaggy up the purgatorial mount, and the gentler Severn route starting from the maple walk.

Although the locomotive seen hauling the 4.33 as it departs carries a smokebox number 80097, it is actually a Southern Region tender locomotive. About two weeks after Ruskin’s return from the continent, Gordon came to dinner at Denmark Hill on Friday 12 August; this was a moment of welcome respite and "pleasant rest" ( Diaries, II, 700). He was invited again for dinner on Wednesday 12 October 1870 and was "delightful" ( Diaries, II, 705) with Joan Agnew and Lily Armstrong, the attractive young Irish girl whom Henry James met in 1869. Lily Armstrong (later Mrs Kevill-Davis) was a former pupil of Winnington School and she remained a lifelong friend of Ruskin. Ruskin had a short overnight stay at Gordon’s rectory in Easthampstead on the night of Thursday 27 October 1870, returning home on the Friday and experiencing a "various quarrel on the way" ( Diaries, II, 705). For whatever reason, Ruskin was concerned that he had not written to Gordon, perhaps to thank him for his hospitality on 27-28 October. He notes in his diary of 3 November: " Must write to Gordon" ( Diaries, II, 706). Princeton University; John Ruskin Collection (CO 196): Folder 11 (AM 15328). The collection contains 25 letters sent by Ruskin to members of the Layton family between 1884-87. The promotion to Professor of Fine Art at Oxford did not alleviate Ruskin’s sorrow and highly charged emotional state. His unrealistic hopes of being united with Rose La Touche were dashed by her refusal to speak to him or have anything to do with him at a chance encounter at the Royal Academy in Burlington House on 7 January 1870 (Hilton, Later Years 171-72). Rose had either categorically rejected him or was playing games with him. Ruskin sought to assuage his pain by surrounding himself with a number of interesting and supportive friends. Among these were Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris – both were frequent visitors – invited to dinner on Wednesday 12 January. Consoling and loyal friend Gordon came on Friday 14 January. Perhaps some light entertainment would alleviate Ruskin's distress? That evening, Gordon and Ruskin went to the Haymarket Theatre in central London for a performance of New Men and Old Acres, a comedy by Tom Taylor and A. W. Dubourg ( Diaries, II, 693). Rudolf Diesel is issued a patent for his internal combustion engine; Diesel's engine eventually replaces steam power.Gordon kept Ruskin, then staying in a Sacristan's Cell in a Roman Catholic monastery in Assisi, informed about his private and social life. There had been a gap in their relationship. Gordon, seemingly not knowing that Ruskin was abroad, had gone to see him in Oxford but learned that he "had departed the day before". He was planning to go to Shropshire the following day, 12 June, to visit his sister Jane at her country mansion Stanmore Hall, near Bridgnorth. He also wrote about his invitation, two weeks before, to dine with "Mr Ritchie" at Highgate, in north London: it was his first visit and he was "quite charmed with the view". "The house", he continued, "is about on the level of the Cross of St Pauls". Henry Ritchie had been John James Ruskin's trusted clerk in his Billiter Street office. * In early autumn (on 9 October 1867), Gordon travelled to Ireland for the wedding of his neighbour Lady Alice Hill (daughter of the Marquis of Downshire) and Lord Kenlis at Hillsborough (County Down). He was invited not only as a guest but he had a religious role. Along with the Venerable the Archdeacon of Down and the Rev. St. George, he assisted the Lord Bishop of Down and Connor in the performance of the marriage ceremony. It was a glittering occasion and in the evening the town was illuminated and bonfires blazed on the surrounding hills. On 11 October 1867 The Times reported that the festivities would continue on the Downshire estates "for some days" (9). Our gardens and woodland have varying levels of gradient, appropriate footwear for a walk in the countryside is recommended. Chapter One. Allegations of Perversion James L. Spates, Professor of Sociology Emeritus, Hobart and William Smith Colleges

Early in the 1970s, before the accusations of pedophilia arrived, Ruskin had been the exemplar used, most famously by Kate Millet (“Debate”; Sexual), as an instance non pareil of the nineteenth century belief in “dual spheres,” an ideology that championed male dominance. Men, Ruskin said in his lecture “Of Queens’ Gardens” (1864), were the gender which, by virtue of its intrinsic nature, was charged with the responsibility of culture-building—making war, governing, thinking deeply; in contrast, women, possessors of a different intrinsic nature, were more suited to home-building. It was a bifurcation, Millet and others argued which, by definition, disallowed the full development of women’s potential and humanity, forcing almost all of them into the secondary and less powerful roles of family creators and maintainers. Millet’s thesis generated many, sometimes heated, responses both in support of and in challenge to it, some focusing on whether or not Ruskin deserved the symbolic status of “intransigent gender traditionalist” he had been accorded: cf. (among others) on the support side, Lloyd; Pierce; on the revisionist side, Birch; Sonstroem; O’Gorman (“Manliness”). It is possible that this widely public argument made later proposals that Ruskin was disposed to the sexual exploitation of little girls and young women less surprising.

After Whitehouse’s death in 1955, Brantwood came under the care of his successor, Lord Lloyd of Kilgerran. In 1973, the nature trail was opened, and in 1982, the Linton building was renovated.

I wrote to her [Joan Severn] to say how glad I was that you had declined to waste your strength on public lecturing – All you say on that subject is perfectly true. People go simply (at least the mass of them) to be amused and many of them come across with the idea that they have done you a compliment by attending. It is perfectly monstrous to expect any man to waste his strength and shorten his life, for what not one in 100 is able to value, or cares for, one hour after the lecture is over! I believe too that lecturing has a bad effect on the performer himself. You will do well to confine your lecturing to workers and students who will value it [.] When I used to attend lectures, I used to find that I knew part before that I could not understand and then part – and that the residuary quantity did not always agree with me. As happened on more than one occasion at Winnington Hall, the girls’ school where Ruskin taught in the 1860s: Burd, Winnington: 500. Brantwood is an independent registered charity no. 504743 – The Brantwood Trust Coniston Cumbria LA21 8AD

Chapter One. Allegations of Perversion

John Ruskin (1819-1900), Writer, artist and social reformer. Sitter associated with 80 portraits. Identify Half a decade later, another biographer, Wolfgang Kemp, perhaps following Hilton’s lead, informed his audience that Ruskin was a “nympholeptic.” (288) The word derives from “nympholepsy,” originally indicating “an ecstasy inspired by nymphs.” Today, it more commonly refers to “a passion or desire aroused in men by young girls” ( OED). (Because Kemp offers no explanation of why he chose the term and the fact that it is mentioned nowhere else in the scholarly or medical literature on sexual orientations, I do not refer to it again.) If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences. — W. I. Thomas, early twentieth-century sociologist