Ruskin's "Death in the Garden"

Paul L. Sawyer, Professor of English, Cornell University

Footnote 17, Chapter 5, of the author's Ruskin's Poetic Argument: The Design of the Major Works, which Cornell University Press published in 1985. It appears in the Victorian web with the kind permission of the author, who of course retains copyright.

In one of the early Letters to a College Friend, Ruskin concludes that there was death in the Garden, since death is found in the very seed of life: "that which has not in it the beginning and germ of death, is not a tree.... the very meaning of the word flower is something to supply death." But at the same time, he believes that "man in Eden was a growing and perfectible animal, that when perfected he was to have been translated or changed, and to leave the earth to his successors without pain.... I believe the whole creation was in Eden what it is now, only so subjected to man as only to minister to him‹ never to hurt him." Even here, Ruskin's conception of Eden is not static or "perfect" (I, 476, 478). Later in his life Ruskin associates the seed with the beginning of death and the flower with fulfillment.

Last modified December 2000