Recreating Eden: A Natural History of Botanical Gardens

摘要

Mary Soderstrom?ˉs lively tour of nine botanical gardens puts each into an historical and philosophical context. She has picked threerepresentatives of the oldest gardens, three from the 19th century, and three from the 20th. The result gives an overview of some of history?ˉsfascinating byways and characters, and an exploration of how societies have perceived God?ˉs role in the natural world. The thumbnail sketches ofthe botanists and explorers are rendered with Soderstrom?ˉs usual clean prose. A large mass of material is presented, but each chapter is brokendown into titled sub-divisions which help make the information accessible.