Description
Book SynopsisTrade Review“For further enjoyment, pick up Lawrence’s
Gardening for Love.” -- Katharine White * Town & Country *
“Lawrence is one of those garden writers who bring literature, philosophy, landscape design, dirt gardening, and the voices of her friends and neighbors into the garden. Her books—
A Southern Garden,
The Little Bulbs,
Gardens in Winter—are enlivened by her genius for trading both plants and stories, but this one is particularly enriched by the lively notices from the
Mississippi Market Bulletin, a biweekly published by the Mississippi Department of Agriculture that advertised everything from hogs to the bulbs and plants that hard-working farm women hoped to sell for ‘mad’ money.” * Natural History *
“No American gardening writer has been more admired than the late Elizabeth Lawrence of North Carolina. To have a posthumously published book of hers is now the sort of bonus that makes one think the world is not so bad after all.” -- Henry Mitchell * Washington Post Book World *
“An enchanting work, unlike any other gardening book in existence.” -- Stanley Kunitz * New York Times Book Review *
“
Gardening for Love is a collection of Elizabeth Lawrence’s writings centered around her 40-year correspondence with the avid gardeners—of rural Mississippi, the Carolinas, Georgia, and other states—who share their seeds and plants by ads in bulletins selling everything from moonvines to puppies.
“As garden writer Allen Lacy points out in his eloquent introduction, Lawrence was far more than just a regional writer. Just as Eudora Welty—the friend who first interested Elizabeth Lawrence in the
Mississippi Market Bulletin— has the voice and feel of her native Jackson, Mississippi, so Lawrence has an intimate knowledge of her home soil.
“But her scope, just like Welty’s, stretches far and deep, reaching into the hearts of not only gardeners, but any reader fascinated with the comings and goings of the human race. . . . There’s a sense of comfort in this book, in the eternity of tending plants that stretch back through the centuries.”
-- Anne Raver * Newsday *
Table of ContentsIntroduction by Allen Lacy 1
Preface: "A Friendly Society" 23
The Mississippi Market Bulletin 35
The North Carolina Agricultural Review 95
The Other Market Bulletins 117
The Herb Gatherers 135
The Private Bulletins 171
Small Blessings 193
Sources 203
List of Common Plant Names 207
Bibliography 219
Index 225
