The armchair book of gardens

Více o knize

People have always created gardens. Where survival depended on fruitful crops, gardens were a link to the divine. Desert dwellers planted trees to banish heat and offer respite. Gardens were the oases that sheltered mythical heroes during their travels, and many religions portray the garden as the closest spot to paradise on Earth. Painters, sculptors, poets, and novelists from all parts of the world have celebrated the garden’s beauty, pondered it’s mysteries, and lamented the frustrations it can bring.This marvellous collection of prose and images explores gardens from many angles, capturing their sensual, spiritual, aesthetic, social, and even political dimensions. Writers as varied as Pliny the Younger, Homer, Ji Chang, the Emperor Jahangir, Boccaccio, A.A. Milne, Colette, Willa Cather, Tom Stoppard, Derek Jarman, Joy Kogawa, W.O. Mitchell, and Jamaica Kincaid evoke the garden in its many incarnations, sometimes lightheartedly, sometimes wittily, sometimes expressing regret or sorrow. Whether the selections portray the garden as a source of sustenance, a showpiece, a place to wrestle down weeds, a bower filled with ghosts, or simply an excuse to spend time in the outdoors, readers will delight in the endless variety of ways humans have carved out a spot for themselves in the natural world.