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Beautiful Madness: One Man's Journey Through Other People's Gardens
Beautiful Madness will do for competitive gardening what Word Freak did for competitive Scrabble, and what Best in Show did for competitive dog breeding. It’s Susan Orlean’s The Orchid Thief with a sense of humor. You’ll never look at a potted plant the same way again.
During an amazing year of living botanically, James Dodson went behind the scenes of the world’s two most important garden shows (the Philadelphia Flower Show and the Chelsea Garden Show in New York City); spent time with the Botticelli of Bulbs; attended a rare plant auction of high rollers; sneaked into a Hosta convention; communed with the kindred spirits of Thomas Jefferson and John Bartram; met a man smuggling exotic day lilies; learned the inside poop on ten or twelve of the Western world’s most influential gardens; swiped cuttings from a Founding Father’s shrubbery; hung out with ten or twelve of the most accomplished gardening fanatics on earth; built three new gardens of his own; and wound up hanging perilously from a limb on the side of a cliff in Southern Africa, the birthplace of an estimated one-third of the world’s flowers, where he capped off his year of incalculable learning and discovery by tagging along with four of America’s leading plant hunters on an expedition into the rugged jungles to find the exotic new species of tomorrow.
During an amazing year of living botanically, James Dodson went behind the scenes of the world’s two most important garden shows (the Philadelphia Flower Show and the Chelsea Garden Show in New York City); spent time with the Botticelli of Bulbs; attended a rare plant auction of high rollers; sneaked into a Hosta convention; communed with the kindred spirits of Thomas Jefferson and John Bartram; met a man smuggling exotic day lilies; learned the inside poop on ten or twelve of the Western world’s most influential gardens; swiped cuttings from a Founding Father’s shrubbery; hung out with ten or twelve of the most accomplished gardening fanatics on earth; built three new gardens of his own; and wound up hanging perilously from a limb on the side of a cliff in Southern Africa, the birthplace of an estimated one-third of the world’s flowers, where he capped off his year of incalculable learning and discovery by tagging along with four of America’s leading plant hunters on an expedition into the rugged jungles to find the exotic new species of tomorrow.
This yeoman’s tale of shared horticultural obsession burrows deeply into the story of how Americans became such fanatical gardeners and are today, in fact, at the forefront of what everyone agrees is a new Golden Age of Gardening, an unprecedented growth in gardening’s popularity that has—according to a recent Gallop poll—an astonishing eighty percent of adult Americans claiming to be primary hobby gardeners.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published March 2, 2006
2 people are currently reading
51 people want to read
About the author
James Dodson
62 books44 followersJames Dodson is the author of seven books, including Final Rounds and Ben Hogan: An American Life. He lives with his family in Southern Pines, North Carolina."
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
June 7, 2021
Edited and pictures added 6/7/2021
A romp through the world of gardening and a kind of a primer of what you need to know to talk gardening. We read of famous historical gardeners and gardens and famous stories of plant cultivation.
The author takes us on tours of well-known and historical gardens in the USA, Britain and South Africa. We learn of many classic gardening events such the annual Philadelphia, Boston and London garden shows, and White Flower Farm in Connecticut, "the LL Bean of the garden world."
In between travels, the author (b. 1953) struggles to apply what he has learned to his own patch of ground in Maine. Mostly he is a writer of books about sports, especially golf.
A nice companion piece to American Garden Writing: An Anthology by Bonnie Marranca.
Top photo of the White Flower Farm from patch.com
Philadelphia Garden Show from phillymag.com
The author from wbur.org
A romp through the world of gardening and a kind of a primer of what you need to know to talk gardening. We read of famous historical gardeners and gardens and famous stories of plant cultivation.
The author takes us on tours of well-known and historical gardens in the USA, Britain and South Africa. We learn of many classic gardening events such the annual Philadelphia, Boston and London garden shows, and White Flower Farm in Connecticut, "the LL Bean of the garden world."
In between travels, the author (b. 1953) struggles to apply what he has learned to his own patch of ground in Maine. Mostly he is a writer of books about sports, especially golf.
A nice companion piece to American Garden Writing: An Anthology by Bonnie Marranca.
Top photo of the White Flower Farm from patch.com
Philadelphia Garden Show from phillymag.com
The author from wbur.org
April 12, 2020
Spring is here. Our two lilacs, one in front and one in back, are nearly finished blooming; the roses have leafed out and have little buds everywhere; there was a hummingbird at the tiger aloe blossoms the other day; and the pomegranate that had its first ever winter pruning in 30 years has responded with a host of new leaves and even two blossoms.
So I decided now was the perfect time to read this book by James Dodson about gardening. What I was surprised at was that he is not just interested in simple gardening like me, he is a big deal amateur garden planner who took a year to go around visiting fancy flower shows and historic gardens both in the USA and England. That is a little more than a simple 'journey through other people's gardens' as described on the front cover.
Once I realized the type of garden book this was, I adapted pretty quickly. The behind the scenes adventures at the Philadelphia Flower Show were my favorite part of the whole book, except for the bits scattered throughout where Dodson talks about his own gradually blooming interest in gardening. It took over his life when he bought property in Maine and decided to create something spectacular on it.
There is a lot of plant name-dropping of the type that is usually beyond me. Sometimes in Latin, sometimes just by regular old English. I may be able to form mental pictures of quite a few flowers, bushes and trees, but there are many many more that are just words to me. And if a person is feeling a bit lazy and doesn't want to spend hours looking up what this or that word actually looks like in the plant world, then there is an awful lot of just words here that never got translated to images. I can't help it, when I am curled up under the covers I don't want to get up and go to the computer room every few minutes. So a lot of the book slipped past me due to my own laziness.
I enjoyed everything until the author went to Monticello, where he admits to breaking off eight pieces of a boxwood hedge to take home for his own garden. I'm sorry, I may be riding a very high horse here, but you just are not supposed to do such things. If everyone who went to Monticello to visit Thomas Jefferson's house and garden were to do the same thing, there would soon be nothing left of the place at all. This annoyed me so much that I could not keep myself interested in the rest of the book and merely skimmed through it. I can't help it, I thought of the man ever after as a disrespectful plant thief. (But I must admit, a plant thief with a nice writing style and a great sense of humor.)
I hope Dodson and his garden have prospered since 2006 when this book came out. There were no pictures here but there was a web address at the very back where supposedly a person could go see photos of his 'travels through the plant world', but it never worked for me. The revenge of the stolen boxwood hedge, perhaps?
So I decided now was the perfect time to read this book by James Dodson about gardening. What I was surprised at was that he is not just interested in simple gardening like me, he is a big deal amateur garden planner who took a year to go around visiting fancy flower shows and historic gardens both in the USA and England. That is a little more than a simple 'journey through other people's gardens' as described on the front cover.
Once I realized the type of garden book this was, I adapted pretty quickly. The behind the scenes adventures at the Philadelphia Flower Show were my favorite part of the whole book, except for the bits scattered throughout where Dodson talks about his own gradually blooming interest in gardening. It took over his life when he bought property in Maine and decided to create something spectacular on it.
There is a lot of plant name-dropping of the type that is usually beyond me. Sometimes in Latin, sometimes just by regular old English. I may be able to form mental pictures of quite a few flowers, bushes and trees, but there are many many more that are just words to me. And if a person is feeling a bit lazy and doesn't want to spend hours looking up what this or that word actually looks like in the plant world, then there is an awful lot of just words here that never got translated to images. I can't help it, when I am curled up under the covers I don't want to get up and go to the computer room every few minutes. So a lot of the book slipped past me due to my own laziness.
I enjoyed everything until the author went to Monticello, where he admits to breaking off eight pieces of a boxwood hedge to take home for his own garden. I'm sorry, I may be riding a very high horse here, but you just are not supposed to do such things. If everyone who went to Monticello to visit Thomas Jefferson's house and garden were to do the same thing, there would soon be nothing left of the place at all. This annoyed me so much that I could not keep myself interested in the rest of the book and merely skimmed through it. I can't help it, I thought of the man ever after as a disrespectful plant thief. (But I must admit, a plant thief with a nice writing style and a great sense of humor.)
I hope Dodson and his garden have prospered since 2006 when this book came out. There were no pictures here but there was a web address at the very back where supposedly a person could go see photos of his 'travels through the plant world', but it never worked for me. The revenge of the stolen boxwood hedge, perhaps?
Currently reading
March 9, 2008I'd read Flower Confidential and a variety of Michael Pollan titles and was starting to enjoy the genre of horticultural non-technical non-fiction.
With a title like Beautiful Madness I truly expected more. Instead of really explaining any madness, I felt like it was simply a romp through a few months of name-dropping.
Perhaps someone was mad for gardening, but I really did not get a sense for it. I got that author repeated explaining his own gardenlust, or waxing lyrically about how great this or that gardener is.
Even his journeys into historical Jeffersonian gardening didn't really do much for me.
Instead, there's paragraph after paragraph filled with a litany of the names of gardening superstars.
Bottom line, I felt empty after reading it, and would almost say it was a travel book where the destinations were simply linked by plants.
With a title like Beautiful Madness I truly expected more. Instead of really explaining any madness, I felt like it was simply a romp through a few months of name-dropping.
Perhaps someone was mad for gardening, but I really did not get a sense for it. I got that author repeated explaining his own gardenlust, or waxing lyrically about how great this or that gardener is.
Even his journeys into historical Jeffersonian gardening didn't really do much for me.
Instead, there's paragraph after paragraph filled with a litany of the names of gardening superstars.
Bottom line, I felt empty after reading it, and would almost say it was a travel book where the destinations were simply linked by plants.
December 20, 2015
Beautiful Madness by James Dodson (Dutton 2006) (635.09741) is a true freebie. I picked it up from the discard bin at our local used book store. It was one of the books that the store declined to buy; there's a bin placed outside the shop where most folks toss any books that even the used book stores assigns no value. Anyway, it's a journal of a year in which a passionate non-professional gardener toured the recommended gardens of other passionate gardeners both in the U.S. and in England. The author was not without resources and connections; he is and was a golf writer for several national magazines. It was interesting as a travel record rather than as a gardening book, but it has turned me on to the Philadelphia Flower Show. My rating: 4/10, finished 5/2/11.
June 2, 2010
I think I would have enjoyed this more as a series of articles, read over time. I found a lot of the stories interesting enough to make me want to keep reading, but I also just wanted to be done with the book so I could read something else (I'm not so good at reading several books at once).
The number of typos in this book was downright frustrating. I almost wanted to mark it up and send it in... but (1) it was a library book, and (2) I wouldn't actually do that :)
The number of typos in this book was downright frustrating. I almost wanted to mark it up and send it in... but (1) it was a library book, and (2) I wouldn't actually do that :)
April 21, 2009
Books like this draw me in terribly. I am a sucker for travel memoirs. I had to chuckle to myself when I started it, thinking here I go again, someone is going to get me obsessed with yet another thing.
February 17, 2010
Just started, but interesting bits about gardening, my personal passion. A year of indulging in the gardening quests most of us gardeners can only dream about. Lots of gossip about the movers and shakers in the field of horticulture. Fun.
November 16, 2011
Author was irritating (repeating phrases incessantly, agrandising himself), writing was below average, but I was interested in the subject matter: gardens, garden shows (Philadelphia, Chelsea) and most of all, exploring and photographing plants in South Africa and meeting interesting people there.
January 15, 2017
I tried to read this book straight through and found it difficult to keep all the venues and exhibits straight after a while. I think this information is better suited to a magazine or newspaper series where each episode could be enjoyed as a single event.
January 4, 2009
Too boring to finish.
January 21, 2009
Recommended by Pat. It was so, so.
November 22, 2013
I love books like this that take me into a world that I didn't know anything about before.
August 2, 2016
What a delight for a plant & garden nerd as myself. Not only did it have me researching some plants, but also listing some gardens in my Garden Tour Bucket list. Sharing the "gardenlust" !!
August 2, 2016
Delight for a garden geek as myself. Plants to seek, gardens to visit. Yes!
August 27, 2016
Totally fun read for all the plant geeks out there. Informative and enticing.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews