Garden Stories

The gardens in various literary works are explored, showcasing their beauty and significance. From the perspective of a snail in Virginia Woolf's Kew Gardens to a sheltered teenage girl in Katherine Mansfield's The Garden Party, and from the succulent vegetables and fruits hauled by the family in Doris Lessing's Flavours of Exile to the extravagantly blooming flowers in Colette's Bygone Spring, the gardens become places of discovery, solace, and haunting. Children find their own peculiar paradises in Sandra Cisneros's The Monkey Garden and Italo Calvino's The Enchanted Garden, while adult gardeners find things that move and haunt them in William Maxwell's The French Scarecrow and Jamaica Kincaid's The Garden I Have in Mind. The anthology also includes the beautiful but fatal garden of Nathaniel Hawthorne's Rappaccini's Daughter, the crystal buds of J. G. Ballard's The Garden of Time, and the ravenous orchids in John Collier's Green Thoughts. This book is a must-read for anyone who loves gardens and the beauty of nature.

Format: Hardback
Length: 400 pages
Publication date: 14 April 2022
Publisher: Everyman

In Virginia Woolf's Kew Gardens, a snail takes in the breathtaking splendor of the gardens, while Katherine Mansfield's The Garden Party offers a glimpse into the sheltered world of a teenage girl. Doris Lessing's Flavours of Exile depicts the family's harvests of succulent vegetables and fruits from the rich African soil. Colette's Bygone Spring immerses readers in a world of extravagantly blooming flowers. Children, in Sandra Cisneros's The Monkey Garden and Italo Calvino's The Enchanted Garden, discover their unique paradises. Adult gardeners, on the other hand, are haunted by the strange and moving creatures found in William Maxwell's The French Scarecrow and Jamaica Kincaid's The Garden I Have in Mind.

Gardens of the mind round out the anthology, encompassing the beautiful but fatal garden of Nathaniel Hawthorne's Rappaccini's Daughter, the crystalline buds of J. G. Ballard's The Garden of Time, the ravenous orchids in John Collier's Green Thoughts, and Aoko Matsuda's Planting, in which a young woman plants whatever she has been given—roses, violets, buttons, broken cups, love, fear, and sorrow.

This captivating book is a must-read for anyone who appreciates gardens and the inherent beauty of nature.

Weight: 408g
Dimension: 123 x 188 x 29 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781841596327