Blount, AR; (2005) Sir John Soane's museum: Changelessness and change. Doctoral thesis , UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

It is a tale well known in our circles. Sir John Soane, the 'romantic artist ,1 'difficult'2 in the way of romantic artists. When 'nothing tended to ruffle his mind, his manner was animated and presupposing in an eminent degree',3 but his excessive reaction to any form of criticism'4 made him a 'captive to his own self-torturing mind'.5 Possessing many 'personal idiosyncrasies',6 he nonetheless felt with the utmost acuteness those unsparing reflections upon his peculiarities'.7 'He was not, in the ordinary sense, a happy man',8 for 'his happiness was only such as he could ring from a jealous and hostile world'.9 Given his 'complex character',10 'he was irritable, impetuous and intractable'11 and given to 'petulant wrangles'.12 With his 'terse notebooks'13 and 'self-justifying pamphlets',14 which featured 'occasional explosions of anger or self-pity',15 he gave into 'inner conflicts'16 that a better disciplined mind would have disregarded'.17 Always 'impatient of criticism',18 his 'complex character',19 almost 'paranoiac',20 displayed 'edginess and vanity',21 and 'he could not bear a contradiction'.22 'In curiously unimportant ways Soane could be mean',23 and his 'persecution complex and unyielding Old Testament morality'24 fuelled 'his inability to weigh his misfortunes against his blessings'.

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