In this most interesting book Jan Marsh examines the paradox underlying the transformation of England from an economy based on agriculture to one based on industry. By 1880 that had happened irreversibly and yet while the rural population was rapidly declining, the back-to-the land movement began to pervade all areas of life and thought. Jan Marsh chronicles the many manifestations of the pastoral impulse. From simple nostalgia to sophisticated political thought she looks at agrarian communes, the folk-song movement, peasant arts, garden cities, the reclamation of common lands, schools, dress and diet, and at the life and thought of such key figures as John Ruskin, William Morris and Edward Carpenter. The book is divided into four parts: The Cult of the Countryside, Tilling the Earth, Rustic Arts and Crafts, Pioneers of the New Life. 'I read it with delight. It is beautifully done - the research, the argument and above all the clarity of the writing.' Adam Nicholson 'An eminently readable survey of the pastoral aspect of the aesthetic movement dominated by Ruskin, Morris and Carpenter around the turn of the century'. Deborah Singmaster, Times Literary Supplement 'A synoptic study which includes dress reform, the folk-song and folk-dance movement, the impulse to safeguard commons, footpaths and ancient monuments, the revolution ins gardening, progressive schools like Abottsholme and Bedales... when we dine out in Fulham and sit round a scrubbed deal table with a string of onions hanging over earthenware crocks, we are paying tribute to the potency of the ideologies this book entertainingly chronicles.' Colin Ward, New Society

Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon, Anna Mary Howitt, Rosa Brett, Anna Eliza Blunden, Jane Benham Hay, Joanna Mary Boyce, Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal, Rebecca Solomon, Emma Sandys, Julia Margaret Cameron, Lucy Madox Brown, Catherine Madox Brown, Marie Cassavetti Zambaco, Francea Alexander, Evelyn De Morgan, Kate Elizabeth Bunce, Marianne Preindelsberger Stokes, Christina Jane Herringham, Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale.

'Jan Marsh's book is the best researched and fullest biography of Rossetti we have yet had.' Fiona MacCarthy, New York Review of Books'Although never formally part of the Pre-Raphaelite poetic school, which included her brother Gabriel, William Morris, and Algernon Swinburne, Christina Rossetti has always been linked to it. [Jan Marsh] gives full attention to both the individual and her unique variety of fantastic and devotional poetry... Marsh delineates an appealing person while examining her adolescent nervous breakdown, abortive engagement to a lapsed Catholic painter, frustrated love for an absentminded scholar, and relationships with her devout but hearty sister, Maria, and with her brothers... The author's steady, sympathetic course through Rossetti's divided life enables readers to delve into the intense and original self most fully expressed in her poetry.' Kirkus Review

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was a group of nineteenth-century artists who challenged contemporary art with their commitment to realism and 'truth to nature'. Renowned as much for their social relationships as for their artistic ideals, the lives of the Pre-Raphaelites - Holman Hunt, Rossetti, Millais, Burne-Jones and Morris - illustrate the full range of human experience, from personal tragedy to triumph. Jan Marsh explores both the individual personalities and the artistic force which bound the circle together.

The work of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and their followers is enduringly popular and correspondingly familiar to a wide public. Works by women artists within the Pre-Raphaelite style have, however, largely been forgotten and ignored in the history of the movement. This book, published to accompany an exhibition in Manchester, England, brings together paintings, drawings, photographs, and other works that women contributed to the Pre-Raphaelite movement. Many are reproduced and documented here for the first time. Spanning three generations from the 1840s to the early 1900s, the artists include Barbara Bodichon, Anna Howitt, Rosa Brett, Anna Blunden, Jane Benham Hay, Joanna Boyce, Elizabeth Siddal, Rebecca Solomon, Emma Sandys, Julia Margaret Cameron, Lucy and Catherine Madox Brown, Marie Spartali Stillman, Maria Zambaco, Francesca Alexander, Evelyn De Morgan, Kate Bunce, Marianne Stokes, Christina Herringham, and Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale. Their works demonstrate that Pre-Raphaelitism is a broader historical movement than has previously been recognized and that women were active in all its phases. Their re-inclusion in Pre-Raphaelite history will redefine its scope, concerns, and achievements, as well as restore a wealth of neglected works to public attention.

This absorbing biography recovers for readers the life of the author of "Goblin Market" and "My heart is singing like a bird", and shows that, far from being a pious and melancholy recluse, Rosetti was a complex and fascinating woman whose poetry is at last receiving the attention it deserves. Photos.

Red House occupies an extraordinary place in British architectural history. It was the first and only house that William Morris ever built. It was the first independent architectural commission from his friend, Philip Webb. The challenge of furnishing the house inspired Morris to found the design firm of Morris & Co. It had a great influence on the Arts & Crafts Movement. But it is also a house that captured William Morris's heart. He was only twenty-five when, in 1858 he decided to buy the site at Bexleyheath, just outside London, but in a rural Kentish setting. He had recently married Jane Burden, daughter of an Oxford ostler, whose particular beauty became inspiration for so much pre-Raphaelite art. With his young wife and his wealth he planned to produce a vision of earthly paradise at Red House. Rosetti described it as 'more a poem than a house', Morris called it 'our place of art', and when he was obliged to give it up for financial reasons in 1865, he resolved never to return. His biographer recorded that he could 'never set eyes on it again, confessing that the sight of it would be more than he could bear'. Red House was saved from an uncertain future in January 2003 by the National Trust, and has already opened its doors. Visitors will be able to see some of the original furnishings but many are now at Kelmscott Manor, the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow, the Victoria & Albert Museum and other locations. This book, however, will provide both the story of Red House and a 'virtual tour' to enable the reader to see how the house looked and functioned when William Morris, his family and friends lived there.