A Breath from Elsewhere: Musings on Gardens - Softcover

"The charm of gardening is that as everything is forever on the move, you can change and alter things as you go along.... Whatever nourishes your impulses should be your launching pad," writes Mirabel Osler, underlining her enthusiasm for "vicarious gardening," an approach she encourages both the novice and the experienced gardener to consider when thinking about their own patches, in her new book, A Breath from Elsewhere.

Offering her wise, witty, and exceedingly insightful views on gardening, Osler (A Gentle Plea for Chaos) winds her way down the garden path, pausing to address the beginners--those individuals tempted, yet still hesitant--and continuing with folks "who have already launched themselves into the unknown region but have not yet found their bearings." The final stop is for those nearing the end of their gardening lives, "for widows and widowers, partners and lovers, who may be struggling to keep the garden going but who can't release themselves from it without being overwhelmed by guilt." With such chapter headings as "There Are No Right Ways to Make a Garden," and "Surfing the Flower Beds," greenhorn gardeners will find comfort as well as inspiration from Osler's candid discussions, while "Dead-Heading the Guilt" allows seasoned gardeners to let go, move on, and make a garden of their own. After all, "by jumping in the deep end rather than treading water, it is possible to do something radical."

Osler's argument--to break the golden rules, follow your instincts, and create the garden that you desire--is made ever stronger by her personal approach, pointed humor, and skillful storytelling, effectively drawing the reader further down the path towards the garden as refuge--a place perfectly suited for "inspiration or freedom, for discovery or surrender." --Stefanie Hargreaves

There are many rooms and seasons in Osler's (A Gentle Plea for Chaos, 1998) garden: alternatives proliferate in the measure of its days, uncertainties mingle with felicities, there is restoration and ferment, there may even be potential for a decaying piano amid the willows and tall grasses. Osler is a contrarian, but not merely for the sake of being one. Its more that there is too much potential for her to be stultified by the anointed arbiters of garden taste. She says, ``Thank goodness for deviancy . . . and for a sense of fun,'' for that is how a garden becomes a creation of ones own, a sanctuary, an incitement to the senses. There is not so much particular advice in these pages as sound notions for toilers in the soil. ``Novice gardeners should allow themselves from the outset the freedom to be as wayward as they want and to follow their instincts.'' She can speak sensibly, in the same breath, of unity and balance in the garden, and of rusted objects and mirrors that she has deployed in an effort to achieve those qualities. And she delights in how both the expected and the unexpected can be milked for pleasure in the garden: urns and vegetables, trees (``neglect these at your peril'') and walls (``no garden should be without a wall''), water and benches and follies all have something to contribute. ``What I want, she writes, is adventure, innovation, foolishness and discovery,'' and that extends to bereaved gardeners who suddenly find themselves ``left with a legacy that too often loads you down with guilt'': don't tread water, make the garden your own. Osler never met a garden bully she didn't instantly dislike. To watch her thumb her nose at the bullies with such flair, and with such gratifying results, is an inspiration. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.