Hopes and Fears for Art

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About this book

The title page names five lectures by William Morris, and the contents list them: The Lesser Arts, The Art of the People, The Beauty of Life, Making the Best of It and The Prospects of Architecture in Civilisation. A list on the page records editions from 1882 to 1911 before this pocket edition of 1919.

In one passage Morris says there was a time when handicraftsmen were all artists, and that art then divided into greater and lesser, leaving contempt on one side and carelessness on the other. Another points to one of 'our own mighty Gothic naves' and how the huge free space satisfies and elevates, and says that what most breeds art is art. A later passage asks whether some people's daily work is chiefly pleasure while others' is wholly irksome and endured only for the sake of leisure.

Arts
Essays

About the author

William Morris

William Morris (1834-1896) was an English poet, designer, and socialist whose wallpapers and textiles helped define the Arts and Crafts movement. Late in life he turned to prose romances set in imagined lands, and those books are now regarded as foundations of modern fantasy literature.