Against Reading: Dickens and the Visual Arts

The essays examines Dickens's response to the Italian Renaissance and particularly his negative assessemnt of Baroque art, sculpture and architecture in Rome, Parma, Mantova. It is subsequently argued that when Dickens in England criticises the Pre-Raphaelites his negative comments highlight the same elements of excess, failing perspective, contorted limbs, grotesque features. In other words, Victorian artists criticise abroad what they are unwilling to read and assess at home, both in Victorian art and culture.