2014
First Published
4.08
Average Rating
144
Number of Pages
A collection of quotations by and about William Morris, exploring his passionately held view that beautiful, functional design should be accessible to all William Morris (1834-1896) was a radical thinker whose democratic vision for society and art has continued to influence designers, artists and writers to this day. He was a gifted poet, architect, painter, writer and textile designer, who also founded the Kelmscott Press, the most famous of the Arts and Crafts private presses. Morris' ideas later came to influence numerous artists and craftspeople who sought to negotiate a viable place within the modern world in the troubled years that followed the First World War. His ideals inspired designers, including those who contributed to the 1951 Festival of Britain, with a direct sense of mission to bring the highest design standards within the reach of everyone. This collection of quotations by Morris, his friends, associates and those who came after, including Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw, among others, reveals and explores his passionately held view that beautiful, functional design should be accessible to all.
Avg Rating
4.08
Number of Ratings
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3 STARS
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goodreads
Author
William Morris
Author · 32 books
William Morris was an English architect, furniture and textile designer, artist, writer, socialist and Marxist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the English Arts and Crafts Movement. Morris wrote and published poetry, fiction, and translations of ancient and medieval texts throughout his life. His best-known works include The Defence of Guenevere and Other Poems (1858), The Earthly Paradise (1868–1870), A Dream of John Ball and the utopian News from Nowhere. He was an important figure in the emergence of socialism in Britain, founding the Socialist League in 1884, but breaking with the movement over goals and methods by the end of that decade. He devoted much of the rest of his life to the Kelmscott Press, which he founded in 1891. The 1896 Kelmscott edition of the Works of Geoffrey Chaucer is considered a masterpiece of book design.
