The Lovers' Parting

Francesa Alexander and John Ruskin

Pen and ink on paper

30.2 x 23.3 cm.

Beckwith, Victorian Bibliomania catalogue no. 32

Roadside Songs of Tuscany, p.143

Collection: John Hay Library, Brown University

When John Ruskin returned to Oxford in 1883 to assume the Slade Professorship for the second time, he titled his first lecture "The Realistic Schools of Painting." In his remarks he discussed the art of Dante Gabriel Rossetti and WWilliam Holman Hunt. Near the conclusion Ruskin displayed a drawing by Francesca Alexander, praising her ability in depicting the impoverished "gracious and blessed" peasants of the Italian hill towns near Florence, where Alexander and her mother lived (Ruskin 33.283-84). Roadside Songs of Tuscany is a collection of some of the stories and poetry Alexander gathered from her Italian friends. [continued below]

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