William Morris

This work describes every aspect of the wide-ranging achievements of William Morris - writer, designer, cultural critic, revolutionary socialist - with particular emphasis on their relevance to our own times. It is written by a group of international scholars who took part in a conference marking the centenary of the death of Morris in 1896. The book has sections devoted to Morris and the environment, Morris and literature (covering texts from "The Earthly Paradise" to the late romances); Morris, the arts and crafts and the New World (including discussion of his influence in Rhode Island, Boston, Ontario and New Zealand); and Morris, gender and politics (with fresh consideration of his relation to Victorian ideas of manliness and of the particular qualities of his anti-statist politics). The latter section also draws attention to a hitherto unknown play by Morris's daughter May and concludes with an account of his late biographer, the late E.P. Thompson.