The Figure in the Landscape

Eighteenth-century England saw the rise of a ''peculiarly English'' art form -- landscape gardening -- and a corresponding change in attitudes toward the natural world. While the French, who lived under tyranny, had tightly organized, restrictive gardens, the ''free'' English enjoyed gardens where they were at liberty to wander. John Dixon Hunt examines eighteenth-century letters, literary and critical works, biographies, paintings, prints, and drawings to trace the gradual movement from formal regularity toward a carefully calculated naturalness.