Second Nature: A Gardener's Education Paperback – Illustrated, 28 Aug. 2003

As a gardener this is a fascinating read with real insight into our relationship with nature. It comes from a very American perspective, and informs about American history and psychology towards nature. It marries this with a personal history and authors own tales of building a garden.I've walked away from it with new ways of thinking about gardening and it's role in our lives. Great book!

This is a thought- provoking, seminal book for any serious gardener. This one is here to stay in my library.

excellent engagement with the nature society relations that every gardener is confronted with. Written in the early 90s, still relevant today.

Excellent

Michael Pollan is writing for an American audience, but this book is, for quite different reasons, fascinating and thought-provoking to a British reader. In Britain, as in most of Europe, there is not a square inch of ground which hasn't been used, managed and often cultivated by man for thousands of years. From the Neolithic hut circles high in the Dartmoor heather to the Saxon coppice-stools still flourishing in the depths of the wood, even the wildest bits of Britain are in a sense, garden; it's something we take for granted. When the first settlers arrived, the (man-made) open glades and groves of New England were regarded as a kind of Eden, an untouched Arcadia, and the Native Americans as archetypes of the Noble Savage. That attitude soon changed, and the rest is history. Only in the mid-nineteenth century, when the European had almost succeeded in obliterating everything natural within US boundaries, did a movement start to preserve, and idolise, what remained of the "Wilderness". Out of this reaction grew an attitude to nature which is curiously schizophrenic. Michael Pollan explores this strange relationship and, through his meditations, the European understands a lot about the culture of the United States.To an American, the area round his or her house, no matter its size, is a "yard". Gardening is "yard work" - a strange masculine blend of tightly controlling nature while paying lip service to revering it. He explains the history and psychology of the American passion for vast areas of mown grass, stretching without boundaries along the fronts of miles of suburban properties, and explores the social pressure not to deviate from the "American way" in your yard. He reveals to us the extraordinary suspicion of most Americans of the "garden" in the traditional British sense; the unease with any form of cultivation which isn't rigidly aimed at producing neat vegetables or regimented floral displays. He explains how Americans who want a garden of the European type still tend to employ English garden designers, no home-grown equivalent being available. All this is remarkable to a European reader and one turns the pages in astonishment.Michael Pollan's book is part gardening autobiography, part sociology, part philosophy. It is rich with interesting stuff, and one doesn't need to be a gardener to get a great deal from it. His style is light and his arguments easy to follow; his project, though polemical, never heavy-handed. My four stars are down to the fact that, as an English reader, much of this is rather redundant; there are long passages which come into the category of "preaching to the converted". If I were an American reader I think it would get the fifth star without any doubt.

I have 5starred it although I have not yet read it. I have been very busy since I bought it, but will send a proper review once I have read it, only "dipped in" so far.

I love this book and have read it many times. It is not a book about the practical aspects of gardening, but it captures the essence of why some of us like to get out there with a spade and try to improve on our surroundings. It is philisophical, funny, profound and inspiring, just the thing to read during winter.

This isn’t simply a discussion of lessons of gardening, though it does tread that ground. However, Pollan uses that topic as a jumping off point to explore a couple of broader topics. First, what defines the American approach to lawns and gardens, which is clearly distinct from that of our Old-World ancestors / comrades? Second, what does it mean to say some approach is more or less “natural” in an ecosystem that has been shaped by the hand of man? As a neophyte balcony-container gardener, I was attracted to the book for its gardening lessons, but I found myself most provoked to thought by these other questions.This book starts with an Introduction to set the stage and a first chapter that contrasts two approaches to lawn and garden that Pollan saw within his own family. The other eleven chapters are divided into seasonally-themed parts. These parts – Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter – touch upon the life of a gardener during each, respective, season.The section entitled Spring discusses the challenge of getting plants to grow against the onslaught of competitors and consumers: animal, vegetative, and other. It also discusses mowing, the open approach to lawns found throughout America, and what the latter means for the former. (It has long intrigued me that many Americans who will pledge liberty or death, often aren’t so big on their neighbor’s liberty if said individual’s lawn gets to about four inches of shag.) Lastly, Pollan educates the reader about the gardener’s passion for compost.The three Summer chapters explore what happens through the middle of the growing phase, including the need to weed. Though Pollan explores the criticisms from the “keep it natural” camp. There’s a lot of discussion of the ideas of Emerson and Thoreau, and how they represented a change from previous thought on the garden. However, the first chapter in this section is about Pollan’s experiences with growing roses, a provocative subject among gardeners, apparently.Fall is harvest season, but the chapter in this section that I found most intriguing was one about planting a tree. This is where Pollan brings the question of what it means to be “natural” to a head. He discusses a nearby piece of protected forest that was decimated by a tornado. There was an ardent debate between those who thought that nothing should be done with the land and it should be allowed to grow back however nature saw fit and others who thought intervention was necessary. The argument can end up turning a position on its head. What if one does nothing and the land is overtaken by a non-indigenous invasive species?The last section has an amusing chapter on garden catalogs and how companies’s style and emphasis varies in an attempt to corner a segment of the market.I enjoyed this book, and would highly recommend it not just for gardeners, but for individuals who have an interest in the interplay between nature and humanity.

Den großen Erfolg des Autors kann ich nicht nachvollziehen - er breitet Gemeinplätze und oberflächliches Geplaudere über hunderte von Seiten aus und bietet keinerlei Erkenntnisse, außer, dass er augenscheinlich ziemlich ignorant der Natur gegenüber ist

Vor einigen Jahren habe ich Michal Pollan für mich entdeckt. Ich habe über Audible Botany of Desire" gehört und war von seiner Herangehensweise fasziniert. Seitdem hab ich jedes Buch von ihm entweder gelesen oder über Audible gehört.Soweit ich es erkennen konnte ist dies hier sein erstes Buch gewesen und er enttäuscht mich auch hier nicht!Ich kann es nur jedem Empfehlen!

This is a very personal life adventure, and focus on a particular piece of ground retranslated into a magical garden.

Wonderful fast service! It was wonderful to find this book as I wanted to own it after reading a friend's copy.