by Katharine S. White & Elizabeth Lawrence & edited by Emily Herrin Wilson ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 16, 2002
A splendid, moving collection memorably celebrating two remarkable women's shared affection for the making and tending of...
Letters between the famous New Yorker editor and a distinguished southern garden-writer chronicle their friendship, as well as the joys and travails of gardening.
The correspondence begins in May 1958, when Lawrence writes to congratulate White on her New Yorker essay “A Romp in the Catalogues,” and ends with White’s death in 1977. Lawrence, who lived with her mother in Charlotte, North Carolina, wrote a weekly column for the Charlotte Observer, had published several well-received books, including A Southern Garden, and also designed gardens. White, recently relocated to Maine with husband E.B. White, continued to edit and write for the New Yorker but now had more time to garden and to maintain a correspondence (though illness, travel, and work cause some breaks in the flow here). The two became friends through their letters, meeting only once in 1967. In the correspondence, they commiserate with and encourage each other in writing and gardening projects. White, thanking Lawrence for a copy of her book The Little Bulbs, hopes it will expand her collection of bulbs; she notes in 1959 that she picked roses until the end of November; she details catalogues she receives and tells Lawrence, “I am with you in detesting most garden books and their sentimentality or their jokes.” Lawrence writes that she is “ the most casual gardener. . . . When things get sick I destroy them”; she gives her opinion of Gertrude Jekyll (“best book is Home and Garden”); and describes her long search to find out who or what Ornithogalum balansae was named for—without the capitalization, she wasn’t sure whether balansa “was a place or a person.” Their delight in gardening is increasingly circumscribed by their physical condition: White suffers a series of debilitating illnesses; Lawrence must take care of her bedridden mother and then suffers from painful arthritis.
A splendid, moving collection memorably celebrating two remarkable women's shared affection for the making and tending of gardens.Pub Date: April 16, 2002
ISBN: 0-8070-8558-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Beacon Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2002
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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