Ruskin's childhood, as he describes it in
Praeterita: Outlines of Scenes and Thoughts Perhaps Worthy of Memory in My Past Life (1885-1889), was indulgently guarded but emotionally repressed, a pattern that enhanced the precision of his perception but contributed to the painful quality of his relationships in later life. Although modern critics may be correct in ascribing the details Ruskin chose for inclusion in
Praeterita to the literary conventions of evangelical literature or of spiritual autobiography, Ruskin's reader always remembers the vision of the child trained never to complain and deprived of most amusements, looking out the window at a drainpipe, tracing patterns in the rugs, observing the family's holiday world from a special seat in the family traveling carriage, and studying chapters of the Bible every day with his mother--a practice continued into his teenage years and forming an essential portion of his education.
Ruskin briefly describes his childhood books, especially the rhymes Dame Wiggins of Lee (1823) and Peacock at Home (1807), Maria Edgeworth's Frank and Harry and Lucy (both published in 1801), Jeremiah Joyce's Scientific Dialogues (1800), Seven Champions of Christendom (1616; of interest in terms of his later adopting the name "St.
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