ABSTRACT
The late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century picturesque is the focus of this chapter. Its central figure is John Soane, notably his house, office and museum at 12–14 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London, which he transformed between 1792 and 1837. Drawing parallels between Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Confessions, William Beckford's Fonthill Abbey and Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy, ‘A Life in Ruins’ discusses Soane's architectural autobiography and the themes of dynasty and decay that fuelled it. Concluding my investigation of Soane, Chapter 4 analyses his fascination for the architectural potential of gardens, climate and weather.
