ONE OF THE TIMES AND SUNDAY TIMES'' BEST BOOKS FOR 2022SHORTLISTED FOR THE POL ROGER DUFF COOPER PRIZE 2023''Eye-opening and full of surprises . . . A treasure'' Sunday Times''A biography as rich with colourful characters as any novel'' TelegraphJohn Constable, the revolutionary nineteenth-century painter of the landscapes and skies of southern England, is Britain''s best-loved but perhaps least understood artist.His paintings reflect visions of landscape that shocked and perplexed his contemporaries: attentive to detail, spontaneous in gesture, brave in their use of colourWhat we learn from his landscapes is that Constable had sharp local knowledge of Suffolk, a clarity of expression of the skyscapes above Hampstead, an understanding of the human tides in London and Brighton, and a rare ability in his late paintings of Salisbury Cathedral to transform silent suppressed passion into paint.Yet Constable was also an active and energetic correspondentHis letters and diaries - there are ov