A Year in Our Gardens: Letters by Nancy Goodwin and Allen Lacy

by Nancy Goodwin, Allen Lacy, Martha Blake-Adams (Illustrator)

Overview

This engaging collection of letters follows the course of a year in the gardens of two passionate gardeners, Nancy Goodwin and Allen Lacy. They share a climate zone (7A), but their gardens differ enormously. Lacy gardens on a 100-by-155-foot plot of former farmland in southern New Jersey, on soil so sandy that he must water frequently if he is to garden at all. Goodwin gardens on rich clay loam at her historic piedmont North Carolina home—which comprises more than sixty acres of woodland, meadow, and established plantings—and she refuses to irrigate, because she believes in growing only those plants that are naturally adapted to the conditions of her land.

Through their letters, Lacy and Goodwin provide a charming and revealing chronicle of their lives and the lives of their gardens. They exchange stories of their horticultural successes and failures; trade information about a great many plants; discuss their hopes, fears, and inspirations; and muse on the connections between gardening and music, family, and friendship.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780807837610
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	02/01/2012
Edition description:	1
Pages:	232
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.53(d)

About the Author

Nancy Goodwin founded, owned, and managed the well-known Montrose Nursery from 1984 until its closing in 1993. She has written for Fine Gardening, American Gardener, and other periodicals.

Allen Lacy, Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey and formerly garden columnist for the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, now writes and publishes the gardening newsletter Homeground. His many books include The Garden in Autumn and The Inviting Garden.

Read an Excerpt

Excerpts from the Introduction

My husband, Craufurd, and I moved to Montrose twenty-three years ago. . . . We settled on Hillsborough, North Carolina, primarily because of the quality of its dirt. It is a lovely old town, first developed because native Americans and later European settlers needed fertile land to support themselves. My father spoke in hushed tones about the quality of the soil in this area. We knew of several attractive properties on the edge of town and waited until one came on the market. I often wondered what lay behind the fence separating Montrose from St. Marys Road. We saw it first the day we came to meet the son of Alexander H. Graham, the third generation of the Graham family to live on the property. Mr. Graham had recently died, and there was a chance that his sons would sell it.

I first became aware of Allen Lacy when Craufurd reported that he was enjoying the column by a garden writer in his daily Wall Street Journal. How could this be? What was a Wall Street gardener? I had visions of J. P. Morgan in a high collar with a long cigar, giving orders to his estate staff. Craufurd then started bringing the Journal home, and I read Mr. Lacy's columns during my lunch. What a surprise! Here was a garden writer who did not just write about plants or gardens. He wrote also about philosophy, religion, history, and current events. He embedded his horticulture in the wider world, not just on Wall Street but on any street. And he had style--the power to entertain, to amuse, and to inform.

--Nancy Goodwin

--Allen Lacy

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Winter 1998
Spring
Summer
Autumn
Winter 1999
Index

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

This exchange of letters between [the authors] is the story of their passionate dedication to gardening and to life. . . . The description of . . . unfamiliar plants presents intriguing possibilities for the gardener. Because of the wealth of plants listed in the index, the book can serve as a supplementary reference.—Fine Gardening



Much of the charm and appeal of this exchange lies in how these differences of circumstance shape their respective point of view, and more so in the warm affection and respect each holds for the other.—Magnolia Summer



An engaging addition to the horticultural canon. . . . Both Goodwin and Lacy are exceptionally perceptive writers. Their exchange is marked by an admirably restrained dignity that is not without sometimes whimsical observations. . . . These correspondents have produced a graceful, literate book with their graceful literate letters sent up and down the East Coast. . . . A splendid book.—Durham Herald-Sun



[These] letters are genuine. . . . I longed to jump into the conversation: Nancy, what's the recipe for your deer spray? Allen, how do I subscribe to your newsletter?. . . . An excellent gift book. . . . It's entertainingly distracting, and can be read in bits and pieces or in one go and Martha Blake-Adams's charming line drawings of scenes from both authors' gardens are additional delights.—American Gardener



Everything about the physical book [is] stirring: its elegant shape, the frothy purple light in the dust jacket photograph, enthusiastic endorsements on the back panel. . . . Above all, it was the authors of this collection of letters . . . who drew me headlong into some very pleasurable reading. . . . There is no limit to what thoughtful writers find revealed in minute events in even the smallest of places.—Brooklyn Botanic Garden



A delightful little book. . . . So real are the voices as the two friends discuss their gardens—and life and living—that you'll struggle mightily to keep from joining in and talking about your garden and life, too.—Our State



Readers seldom have a chance to peer as intimately into gardeners' intentions as we do in A Year In Our Gardens. . . . This book is one of the riches in an unusually rich season for literary gardening.—New York Times Book Review



Letter writing, because of the time required and the mental self-editing that time affords, is a different form of communication. Slow, yes. Superior, I'm convinced, especially after finishing A Year in Our Gardens: Letters by Nancy Goodwin & Allen Lacy.—Raleigh News & Observer



Gardeners are often more keenly aware of the natural world than most other folk. . . . Goodwin and Lacy have this gift of observation, and their insights into the world around them make for fascinating reading as they explore subjects as diverse as mulch and Mozart. While they relate the changes in their garden, they also reveal the changes in their lives, sharing their innermost feelings and experiences, as one does only with a very close friend.—Booklist



You visit a magnificent garden, and you say 'Oh, how splendid!' Or you read a garden article, and you say 'How perceptive. How finely crafted.' But unless you have made a magnificent garden or written about one perfectly (or done both) you'll be clueless about the effort and thought that lie behind what you so much admire. Here's your chance to know, for Nancy Goodwin has made a garden that has achieved the attention of the world, and Allen Lacy has written more thoughtfully about gardens than almost anyone living. Their quotidian epistolary chatter has been recorded in this volume of letters, which is vivid not only with garden experience, but with all the strands of life that inevitably feed into both making gardens and writing about them. Their conversations are full of revelation. Buy this book.—Joe Eck, coauthor of Living Seasonally: The Kitchen Garden and the Table at North Hill

Editorial Reviews

A delightful little book. . . . So real are the voices as the two friends discuss their gardens--and life and living--that you'll struggle mightily to keep from joining in and talking about your garden and life, too. ("Our State")

An excellent gift book. It's entertainingly distracting, and can be read in bits and pieces or in one go and Martha Blake-Adams's charming line drawings of scenes from both authors' gardens are additional delights. ("American Gardener")

There is no limit to what thoughtful writers find revealed in minute events in even the smallest of places. (")Brooklyn Botanic Garden")

This book is one of the riches in an unusually rich season for literary gardening. ("New York Times Book Review")

This exchange of letters between [the authors] is the story of their passionate dedication to gardening and to life. ("Fine Gardening")

From the Publisher

This exchange of letters between [the authors] is the story of their passionate dedication to gardening and to life. . . . The description of . . . unfamiliar plants presents intriguing possibilities for the gardener. Because of the wealth of plants listed in the index, the book can serve as a supplementary reference.

Fine Gardening

[These] letters are genuine. . . . I longed to jump into the conversation: Nancy, what's the recipe for your deer spray? Allen, how do I subscribe to your newsletter?. . . . An excellent gift book. . . . It's entertainingly distracting, and can be read in bits and pieces or in one go and Martha Blake-Adams's charming line drawings of scenes from both authors' gardens are additional delights.

American Gardener

Readers seldom have a chance to peer as intimately into gardeners' intentions as we do in A Year In Our Gardens. . . . This book is one of the riches in an unusually rich season for literary gardening.

New York Times Book Review

Gardeners are often more keenly aware of the natural world than most other folk. . . . Goodwin and Lacy have this gift of observation, and their insights into the world around them make for fascinating reading as they explore subjects as diverse as mulch and Mozart. While they relate the changes in their garden, they also reveal the changes in their lives, sharing their innermost feelings and experiences, as one does only with a very close friend.

Booklist

Letter writing, because of the time required and the mental self-editing that time affords, is a different form of communication. Slow, yes. Superior, I'm convinced, especially after finishing A Year in Our Gardens: Letters by Nancy Goodwin & Allen Lacy.

Raleigh News & Observer

There is no limit to what thoughtful writers find revealed in minute events in even the smallest of places.

Brooklyn Botanic Garden

A delightful little book. . . . So real are the voices as the two friends discuss their gardens—and life and living—that you'll struggle mightily to keep from joining in and talking about your garden and life, too.

Our State