Synopses & Reviews
This extraordinarily beautiful book gathers together and examines for the first time a delightful collection of English gardens rendered by artists from 1540 to the early nineteenth century, many of which are unknown. Sir Roy Strong, widely recognized for his expertise in both art history and garden history, surveys garden pictures ranging from Elizabethan miniatures to eighteenth-century alfresco conversation pieces, from suites of paintings of a single garden to amateur watercolors. He inquires into the origin of the English garden picture genre, its development prior to the invention of photography, its greatest exponents, its reliability as historical evidence of actual gardens, and its place within the larger European tradition of picturing the garden.
The English, Strong observes, were slow in picturing the reality of their gardens. Until well into the Stuart age, the garden in art served as a symbol, and only gradually did this give way to the impulse to record the facts of contemporary garden-making. In the backgrounds of portraits of Jacobean and Caroline garden owners, the garden is no longer an emblem; it becomes instead a document demonstrating the owners pride in their gardens made in the new Renaissance manner. By the Georgian age the garden has moved from the back to the foreground of pictures, and whole families place themselves amid the glory of their self-fashioned landscapes. Both house and garden at this point assume a separate identity, each calling for an individual record. And by the nineteenth century, the author shows, the garden detaches itself from owner and house to be recorded for its own sake, as a single image at first, and later in a series. With some 350 fully annotated illustrations, this lovely book offers a unique record of three hundred years of English gardens and what they meant to those who owned and portrayed them.
Review
"This is a wonderful book, full of fascinating detail and stories from a lost world. It will have wide circulation among historians of science and technology, historians of England, and cultural historians in general."Pamela Smith, Columbia University
-- Jonathan Mirsky - New York Review of Books
Review
“
The Jewel House of Art and Nature is by far the finest exploration ever undertaken of scientific culture in an early modern metropolis. Vivid, compelling, and panoramic, this revelatory work will force us to revise everything we thought we knew about Renaissance science.”Adrian Johns, author of
The Nature of the Book
-- Pamela Smith
Review
"In this vivid portrait of the scientific practitioners of Elizabethan London, Deborah Harkness draws on extensive archival research to portray the city as a crucial source of social and scientific innovation and inspiration to Francis Bacon."Ann Blair, Harvard University -- Adrian Johns
Review
"A fascinating account of the worlds of late-sixteenth-century claimants to knowledge, both practical and speculative, in the London of the young Francis Bacon."Peter R. Dear, Technology and Culture -- Ann Blair
Review
". . . a delight to read . . . convinces as good historical discussions should: through the overwhelming weight of meticulously assembled evidence. . . . essential reading for any student of premodern science. It makes valuable and timely contributions to the history of science . . ."Frank Klaasen, Canadian Journal of History -- Peter R. Dear - Technology and Culture
Review
". . . vital and original. . . . Harkness has broadened the well-trodden path of the social history of science in a way that will challenge and shape any future efforts to describe the emergence of the Scientific Revolution. . . . [A] splendid book."Lisa T. Sarasohn, Project Muse -- Frank Klaasen - Canadian Journal of History
Review
“If you are interested in high Elizabethan–style country houses, this is the book for you.”--
Library Journal -- Sharon Kinoshita - Speculum - A Journal of Medieval Studies
Review
"This wondrous book--written by the preeminent historian of British architecture, and beautifully designed and printed. . . combines sweeping range and a precise grasp of detail."--Ben Schwarz,
The Atlantic -- Library Journal
Review
"[Willes] tackles her subject with considerable learning and with a gusto atypical of a scholarly volume. . . . Theres a wealth of information here."Publishers Weekly -- William R. Robison - The Journal of Ecclesiastical History
Review
"A handsome, richly illustrated ramble through the history of book buying. . . . This is a charming book, full of digressionsbiographical and historical nuggets aboundbut it is also clearly the fruit of a remarkable range and depth of research."Peter Walpole,
Virginia Quarterly Review -- Christopher de Bellaigue - New York Review of Books
Review
". . . . This is a fascinating book for anyone with a touch of bibliomania. . . . Much of the information is relevant to book lovers and librarians everywhere. After reading this book, youll never think of book ownership in quite the same way again." Academia -- Peter Walpole - Virginia Quarterly Review
Review
“. . . enchanting and delightful. . . . Willess diligent and skillful research in a wide range of archives is demonstrated on every page. . . . [C]aptivating; it is at once both instructive and entertaining. Anyone who loves books and their history will love Reading Matters.” Peter H. Reid,
Library and Information History -- Academia
Review
and#8220;Willes, who was a publisher for the National Trust, is a true bibliophile who has undertaken an ambitious piece of research that will be invaluable to students of gardens and their history.and#8221;and#8212;Rosie Atkins, History Today
Review
and#8220;and#8230;..all can enjoy the illuminating way Willes puts gardens into context.and#8221;and#8212;Gardens Illustrated
Review
and#8220;Avoid the glut of picture books that blossom at this time of year for this serious study of the social life of the English garden. It will fascinate serious horticulturalists with its explanation of the how the country had already undergone a radical revolution in gardening before the 18th century, which so many thought was its heyday.and#8221;and#8212;Country and Town House Magazine
Synopsis
Focusing for the first time on Tudor and early Stuart country houses in their settings, Paula Henderson offers new perspectives on some of Englands most magical buildings. She examines gardens and natural landscapes as well as gatehouses, walls, garden structures, and banqueting houses to uncover how and why these estates were organized as they were.
Synopsis
The people and publications at the root of a national obsession
In the century between the accession of Elizabeth I and the restoration of Charles II, a horticultural revolution took place in England, making it a leading player in the European horticultural game. Ideas were exchanged across networks of gardeners, botanists, scholars, and courtiers, and the burgeoning vernacular book trade spread this new knowledge still further--reaching even the growing number of gardeners furnishing their more modest plots across the verdant nation and its young colonies in the Americas.
Margaret Willes introduces a plethora of garden enthusiasts, from the renowned to the legions of anonymous workers who created and tended the great estates. Packed with illustrations from the herbals, design treatises, and practical manuals that inspired these men--and occasionally women--Willes's book enthrallingly charts how England's garden grew.
Synopsis
This book focuses for the first time on sixteenth- and early-seventeenth-century country houses in their settings. Investigating the complex relations between Tudor and early Stuart houses and the landscapes in which they were set, Paula Henderson offers new perspectives on some of Englands most magical buildings. She examines natural and man-made landscapes as well as gatehouses, garden buildings, banqueting houses, and other ancillary structures. More than 200 splendid images illustrate the book, which also features a complete gazetteer.
Drawing on new documentary material and on research into many rediscovered buildings associated with original settings, Henderson refutes common perceptions that gardens of the period were confined and highly artificial and that natural” landscapes were not appreciated until the eighteenth century. She explains how and why Tudor country estates were organized and designed, and she provides a new evaluation of what the gardens and other aspects of the landscape meant to those who created and visited them.
Synopsis
This book explores the streets, shops, back alleys, and gardens of Elizabethan London, where a boisterous and diverse group of men and women shared a keen interest in the study of nature. These assorted merchants, gardeners, barber-surgeons, midwives, instrument makers, mathematics teachers, engineers, alchemists, and other experimenters Deborah Harkness contends formed a patchwork scientific community whose practices set the stage for the Scientific Revolution. While Francis Bacon has been widely regarded as the father of modern science, scores of his London contemporaries also deserve a share in this distinction. It was their collaborative, yet often contentious, ethos that helped to develop the ideals of modern scientific research.
The book examines six particularly fascinating episodes of scientific inquiry and dispute in sixteenth-century London, bringing to life the individuals involved and the challenges they faced. These men and women experimented and invented, argued and competed, waged wars in the press, and struggled to understand the complexities of the natural world. Together their stories illuminate the blind alleys and surprising twists and turns taken as medieval philosophy gave way to the empirical, experimental culture that became a hallmark of the Scientific Revolution.
Synopsis
Elizabethan and Jacobean architecture the uniquely strange and exciting buildings built by the great and powerful, ranging from huge houses to gem-like pavilions and lodges designed for feasting and huntingis a phenomenon as remarkable as the literature that accompanied it, the literature of Shakespeare, Spenser, Sidney, Marlow, and others.
In this beautiful and fascinating book, Mark Girouard discusses social structure and the way of life behind it, the evolution of the house plan, the excitement of English patrons and craftsmen as they learned not only about the classic Five Orders and the buildings of Ancient Rome, the surprising wealth of architectural drawings that survive from the period, the inroads of foreign craftsmen who brought new fashions in ornament, but also the strength of the native tradition that was creatively integrated with the antique” style. Behind the book is a vivid consciousness of the European scene: Italy, France, central Europe and above all the Low Countries and their influence on England. But the principal argument of the book is the unique individuality of the English achievement.
The result of new research and fieldwork, as well as a lifetimes observation and scholarship, this remarkable book displays Girouards unique sense of style and his enduring excitement for the architecture of the period.
Synopsis
It is easy to forget in our own day of cheap paperbacks and mega-bookstores that, until very recently, books were luxury items. Those who could not afford to buy had to borrow, share, obtain secondhand, inherit, or listen to others reading. This book examines how people acquired and read books from the sixteenth century to the present, focusing on the personal relationships between readers and the volumes they owned. Margaret Willes considers a selection of private and public libraries across the periodmost of which have survivedshowing the diversity of book owners and borrowers, from country-house aristocrats to modest farmers, from Regency ladies of leisure to working men and women.
Exploring the collections of avid readers such as Samuel Pepys, Thomas Jefferson, Sir John Soane, Thomas Bewick, and Denis and Edna Healey, Margaret Willes also investigates the means by which books were sold, lending fascinating insights into the ways booksellers and publishers marketed their wares. For those who are interested in books and reading, and especially those who treasure books, this book and its bounty of illustrations will inform, entertain, and inspire.
Synopsis
The people and publications at the root of a national obsession
Synopsis
In the century between the accession of Elizabeth I and the restoration of Charles II, a horticultural revolution took place in England, making it a leading player in the European horticultural game. Ideas were exchanged across networks of gardeners, botanists, scholars, and courtiers, and the burgeoning vernacular book trade spread this new knowledge still furtherand#8212;reaching even the growing number of gardeners furnishing their more modest plots across the verdant nation and its young colonies in the Americas.
Margaret Willes introduces a plethora of garden enthusiasts, from the renowned to the legions of anonymous workers who created and tended the great estates. Packed with illustrations from the herbals, design treatises, and practical manuals that inspired these menand#8212;and occasionally womenand#8212;Willes's bookand#160;enthrallingly charts how England's garden grew.
About the Author
Margaret Willes studied modern history and architectural history at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. Her career was spent in book publishing, initially at Weidenfeld & Nicolson, then Sphere Books and Sidgwick & Jackson, before becoming the publisher at the National Trust until her retirement in 2005. Her first book was Reading Matters: Five Centuries of Discovering Books (Yale, 2008), followed by Pick of the Bunch: The Story of Twelve Treasured Flowers (Bodleian, 2009), using the rich source of botanical books and illustrations in the Plant Sciences Department at Oxford. Apart from her student years in Oxford, Willes has always lived in London, most happily in Hackney where, when she is not writing about gardens, she loves cultivating her own.