I finished reading The Queen of the Air (1861) by John Ruskin, an English writer who explored a wide range of topics throughout his life. This book was a collection of four different pieces, all connected in some way to the ideas represented by the Greek goddess Athena.

It took me a while to fall into the cadence of Ruskin’s writing. His prose can be complex and the ideas he unspools seem at times recondite and slightly obscure, perhaps from a deep familiarity with mythology and the King James Bible. Even so, his words are often beautiful and his thoughts poignant. I enjoyed traversing the landscapes of rhythm and ideas he constructs.

Ruskin touches on much in this short book, including ancient Greek understandings of mythology, modern social ills, and theory of art. This was an interesting foray into Ruskin, some of his philosophy, and the spirit of the Victorian era.

“The fact that we delight in certain things—say watching a bee at work or a buffalo herd running—is because it shares with us the same spirit of which, by which, we are made. It is not that these other things were made for us, but that they are made by and with the same that made us and of which we are made.”