News from Nowhere

Overview

Drawing on the work of Ruskin and Marx, this novel is a statement of the author's egalitarian convictions as well as a contribution to the utopian tradition.

Editorial Reviews

Editorial Reviews for this product are not available at this time.

Author Information

Bio of William Morris

MORRIS, WILLIAM (1834-1896), poet, artist, manufacturer, and socialist, was the eldest son and third child of William Morris, a partner in the firm of Sanderson & Co., bill brokers in the City of London, and of Emma Shelton, daughter of Joseph Shelton, a teacher of music in Worcester, and son of John Shelton, proctor in the consistory court of that city. He was born on 24 March 1834, at Elm House, Clay Hill, Walthamstow, his father's suburban residence. In 1840 the family removed to Woodford Hall (now known as Mrs. Gladstone's Convalescent Home), the park of which was conterminous with Epping Forest. As a boy, therefore, Morris had the free daily range of that unique tract of country, then little changed since mediaeval or even since prehistoric times; and these surroundings fostered his natural keenness of eye and romantic bent of temper. He learned to read very young, and never remembered a time when he could not read, but was not notably precocious otherwise. This earlier education was at a small private school in the neighbourhood; from January 1848 until December 1851 he was at Marlborough College, and then lived for nearly a year as a private pupil with the Rev. F. B. Guy, afterwards canon of St. Albans, and then assistant master at the Forest School, Walthamstow. He matriculated at Exeter College, Oxford, in June 1852, and went into residence in January 1853. Morris went up to Oxford with an unusual amount of varied knowledge and a character already strongly marked and well developed. Love of the middle ages was born in him, and was reinforced by the wave of Anglocatholicism which had just spread over England, and which had come as a highly stimulating influence on families brought up, like his, in a somewhat stagnant evangelicalism. Already as a boy he had acquired a singularly minute knowledge of trees, flowers, and birds. At Marlborough he had, with the aid of the school library and all the specimens of ancient building within reach, made himself a good antiquary, 'knowing,' as he afterwards said, 'most of what was to be known about English Gothic;' and Savernake Forest and the Wiltshire downs made a background in complete harmony with his growing sense of romance and love of beauty. At Oxford he at once formed a close friendship with Edward Burne-Jones, who had entered at Exeter together with him, and had brought, from the very different surroundings of middle-class life in Birmingham, an enthusiasm, a knowledge, and a high idealism, which at all points confirmed and supplemented his own. Until Morris's death the two men lived in the closest intimacy, not only of daily intercourse but of thought and work. They were the two foremost figures in a group of undergraduates, chiefly Birmingham schoolfellows of Burne-Jones, which was perhaps more remarkable than any which Oxford has produced since.

Customer Reviews

There are no customer reviews available at this time. To add your review, Register or Sign In to your account using our free eBook Library Software.

Additional Info

Imprint

EBOOKSLIB

Filesize

348.91 KB

Number of Pages

124

eBook ISBN

9781102326144