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PRODUCTION NOTES
John Ruskin (1819-1900) born in London, was the greatest art critic and social commentator of the Victorian Age. His ideas inspired the Arts and Crafts Movement, the founding of the National Trust, the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings and the Labour Movement. He attacked the worst aspects of industrialization and actively promoted art education and museums for the working classes. His work runs to 39 volumes containing nine million words. His correspondence included some 20,000 letters, along with thousands of sketches, drawings and paintings. Euphemia (Effie) Gray Ruskin (1828-1867) was born in Perth, Scotland in a house which formerly was the family residence of John Ruskin’s father. Effie’s father, George Gray, was not a wealthy man, but he was able to send his daughters to young ladies’ seminaries of good repute. She was considered a bright, attractive, lively girl with a strong personality. John and Effie married on April 10, 1848 when she was 19 and he 25, after a long courtship carried on mostly through correspondence. John Everett Millais (1829-1896) was born in Southampton. A child prodigy in art, he entered the Royal Academy at the age of 11, the youngest artist to ever be admitted, and exhibited at the RA from age 17. He became friends with William Holman Hunt and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. The three formed the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1848. Their ideal was to move from a mannerist to a realistic style in painting. Their work, despite vehement criticism from many, was championed by John Ruskin, who has been likened in influence to a modern day “Oprah.” By the time of Millais’ death, he had been made a baronet by the Queen, was the most popular painter in England and President of the Royal Academy. John James Ruskin (1785-1864), John Ruskin’s father, was born in Edinburgh. When he was 16, at his father’s insistence, he abandoned school and began a trade. In London, he became a successful businessman, eventually becoming one of the founding partners of Pedro Domecq Sherries. He married his cousin, four years his senior, after an 8-year engagement. She had come to help his mother manage the family home. Margaret Cox Ruskin (1781-1871) had been well-educated and worked hard to rise above her low background. She had no money and was the daughter of an innkeeper. From the moment that their only child, John, was born, both father and mother invested all their hopes and ideals in his future. Margaret, a strict and pious Evangelical Protestant, took charge of her son’s education using the bible to teach her son to read. Lady Elizabeth Eastlake (1809- 1893) was the wife of Sir Charles Eastlake, President of the Royal Academy and the first President of the Royal Photographic Society. Married to a powerful and wealthy man, she forged an independent career as an exponent of the dominant artistic standards of the day. She was the only woman regularly published in The Quarterly Review. “...the greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something, and tell what it saw in a plain way... To see clearly is poetry, prophecy and religion - all in one.” - John Ruskin The Victorian Era existed through the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901.) Although the prudishness and repression that we associate with this era is often overstated, there is no question of the strict order of affairs in the home. Men did not assist with domestic responsibilities, leaving the women their “natural” duties in keeping house and bearing and raising children. The “angel in the house,” sexually passive, whose responsibility it was to oversee the provision of well-ordered comfort and peace became the literary ideal for middle-class women. Dorothy Sanders, Dramaturg
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