Many years ago, as a result of library research on the great German poet Else Lasker-Schuler, I came across many essays about her and her colleagues.  What struck me most was their unshakeable love of Germany.  Even after the Holocaust, despite their Jewish identity and living in exile with the memories of dead friends and […]

Pity that few remember this remarkable nature writer.  Most likely due to the oversight of Chicago as a serious literary center by the New York publishing world since the 1920s when he was beginning.  Dubkin specialized in birds, insects and bats in cities, which is, ironically, trendy now.  Googling him yields only a few used […]

We held the July 12 Open House at Heronswood’s new gardens in Doylestown, PA, welcoming over 430 people from across the northeast and mid-Atlantic states. We conducted seven garden tours, sold over a thousand rare plants and gave away a young hydrangea to the first 250 guests. It was a great day, though very hot. […]

The “stranded isle” test shows surprising results. Alas, only fifty will fit in my tiny hut, from classics to ephemera. Gone are the thrillers, breakthroughs, manifestos, philosophy and feuilletons; they don’t compare to identity, “imago”, the rough outline and telling detail. However, I include a few strays. Here is what’s left of a gaudy life. […]

Sholom Singer taught me Medieval History at DePaul University in 1974 and 1975.  He was probably in his mid-sixties, with the light blue cotton shirts Chicago guys used to wear buttoned up to the collar with no tie, and black trousers.  He was a fantastic teacher:  erudite, tough and “old school”. Once he interrupted me […]

I’m extremely fortunate to live at Fordhook Farm, the Burpee family redoubt, where we carry on all of our basic ornamental and vegetable research, and put on our summer open houses, the next one being Saturday, July 12th. A 19th century success story, the Burpees were a diverse clan including illustrious fathers, moms, daughters and […]

While visiting Trenton recently, I saw—and realized—that the US is at the threshold of a social reconstruction, similar to the one that occurred from the 1870s to 1920s when millions of immigrants arrived. They were profoundly different from the dominant Anglo-Americans.  A painfully constructed nation, founded by expatriates and led through a civil war by their descendants, was flooded with penniless Germans, Italians, Russians, Poles, Greeks, Portuguese and Chinese.  Emma…

A recent New York state lottery radio commercial bragged that it is “spending billions to educate millions”.  I did a double take, thinking I misheard.  Both liberals and conservatives should find this inadvertent revelation depressing.  It seems that no one is concerned with productivity anymore, that it has become a “bad word”.  However, gardeners know that you spend a little to get a lot.

In the same vein, the current mortgage…

In New York City recently, I was stunned by the majestic beauty of Central Park.  In fact, it’s overwhelming when scrutinized.  Therefore, it has become something like a giant dynamo of the city’s unconscious.  It reminded me of Norman O. Brown’s comment about how we are unconscious of our bodies, how that distinguishes being human.  […]

Most garden perennials flower in spring after the low light season.  However, garden annuals bloom during the summer, which is not typical of native plants in North America.  Mainly tropical in origin, bedding plants have been the focus of breeding since the residential boom of the 1950s.  Annual cultivars descend from plants found near the equator, the only frost-free part of the world.  These heat and light lovers…