Description: For philosophizing gardeners and anyone who likes to pick up a spade and get their hands dirty
Gardenersdiscover a new world every year--whether they're cultivating heirloom
vegetables, foraging for wild herbs, creating a small permaculture
garden on a city balcony, or maintaining a plot for self-sufficiency. But
why garden at all? These personal essays by writers, designers, and
master gardeners dig into gardening's philosophical dimensions and tend
to the aesthetic, cultural, political, and sociological implications of
gardens and the people who keep them. Originally published in
German, this delightful volume addresses gardening's most deep-rooted
questions and highlights the magic that, year after year, makes us pick
up a shovel and get back into the garden. Awarded the German Garden Book Prize in the Best Garden Prose Category "What
is remarkable is that the publication project is something very
individual... the spectrum ranges from the 'plea for weeds' to the
'metaphysics' of the garden to urban gardening and garden shows, and the
realization that gardens are 'hopelessly ambivalent'--all in all a very
interesting volume." - Jury Citation
Brief description:
Blanka Stolz is a writer and editor, and co-founder of the German publisher Mairisch Verlag. She has, during two summers on the Swiss mountain farm Munt la Reita, spent a lot of time in the garden. She lives in Berlin, Germany.
Review Quotes:
"In The Philosophy of Gardening we discover gardens that serve
a variety of purposes; they grow food, celebrate urban
permaculture, introduce us to new friends and pay tribute to weeds. The
essays are written by a diverse group that includes gardeners,
designers, agricultural scientists and philosophers. Their insights into
how and why we garden are universal and a delight to read... This is a
book to read in the garden. I enjoyed the variety of philosophical
musings on the place of gardens in urban spaces, gender in the
garden and the basic drive to garden."--Atlantic Books Today