5 literary GARDENS
1. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, 1911.
WHAT: Thin, disagreeable Mary Lennox is despatched from India to live with her uncle at his manor in England, after cholera strikes and kills her family. Uncle Archibald Craven has been a recluse since the death of his beloved wife; his son Colin is sickly and bed bound. And within the grounds lies a secret garden, locked up and silent.
WHY: More about a forgotten child than a garden, but both blossom together.
2. A Tuscan Childhood by Kinta Beevor, 1993.
WHAT: Aged five, Kinta is taken by her writer mother, Lina Waterfield, from England to live at the Fortezza della Brunella. Painter father Aubrey mixed with the upper bohemians, but this unforgettable memoir evokes peasant Tuscany, too, and a magical rooftop garden.
WHY: Kinta’s first view of the castle in 1916 from a train carriage whisks us off on an unforgettable journey, a unique place in time before war desecrated all.
3. The Lost Garden by Helen Humphreys, 2003.
WHAT: Gardener Gwen Davis departs the clutter of war-torn London for the safety of the English countryside. She takes a job at an estate in Devon, supervising the farming of potatoes for the war effort.
WHY: Spinster Gwen is no fool and trades dance nights for diligent digging. Humphreys’ sympathetic, patriotic protagonist is a gutsy, gallant Gwen – and when she discovers a abandoned garden, we unlock its secrets and hers.
4. The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman, 2011.
WHAT: A fantastical history of Blackwell, Massachusetts, from the pioneers of 1750 to 1970s hippies. Fable-named Johnny Appleseed plants the apple tree that saves villagers from starvation. Then there’s the garden that turns all flowers red.
WHY: The brightest star in the field of fairytale literary fiction, Hoffman’s sense of place is unique. We move through an Alice In Wonderland- like hallucination, but with an illuminating history of progress, too.
5. The Lake House by Kate Morton, 2015.
WHAT: On the night of the 1933 Midsummer’s Eve party, baby Theo Edevane disappears amid a backdrop of glowing lanterns. Cut to 2003 when police detective Sadie Sparrow stumbles upon the abandoned estate.
WHY: Back in 2008, Moreton wrote The Forgotten Garden about a little girl found on a ship to Australia, and her connections to an English stately pile. But seven years on, this is a better polished imagination of a lost house and grounds.