John Ruskin - Portrait - Project Gutenberg

John Ruskin - Portrait - Project Gutenberg

An early "Back-to-Nature" movement, which anticipated the romantic ideal of modern environmentalism, was advocated by intellectuals such as John Ruskin, William Morris, and Edward Carpenter, who were all against consumerism, pollution and other activities that were harmful to the natural world. The movement was a reaction to the urban conditions of the industrial towns, where sanitation was awful, pollution levels intolerable and housing terribly cramped. Idealists championed the rural life as a mythical Utopia and advocated a return to it. John Ruskin argued that people should return to a small piece of English ground, beautiful, peaceful, and fruitful. We will have no steam engines upon it . . . we will have plenty of flowers and vegetables . . . we will have some music and poetry; the children will learn to dance to it and sing it.

None

30 September, 2006

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/John_Ruskin_-_Portrait_-_Project_Gutenberg_eText_17774.jpg

Public Domain under copyright law of the United States

Public domain in the United States

None

Illustration

English

Figures

Environment, Legislation, Consumerism, Pollution, Industrial, John Ruskin

United Kingdom