A unique, stunningly illustrated exploration of North American wildflowers, weaving together history, folklore, and literature.
This beautiful coffee table book pairs the detailed botanical knowledge of a field guide with the evocative power of a literary anthology, offering a new way to appreciate the flora around us. Beyond being a simple identification guide, American Wildflowers is a rich journey through the history, cultural significance, and enduring beauty of the American landscape.
A perfect gift for anyone who seeks a deeper connection to the American landscape, this book is a winner of the American Horticultural Society Book Award.
Each entry is a meticulously crafted profile that includes:
- Striking, full-color botanical illustrations for accurate identification.
- Essential scientific and habitat information.
- Fascinating histories of medicinal, culinary, and decorative uses.
- Cultural folklore and myths associated with the species.
- Poetic and literary excerpts from naturalists, poets, and writers like Henry David Thoreau, Emily Dickinson, John Muir, and Mary Oliver, highlighting the plant's place in American consciousness.
Perfect for gardeners, nature lovers, hikers, and literature enthusiasts alike, this book celebrates the biodiversity of North America and shows how wildflowers have inspired—and continue to inspire—our greatest thinkers and artists.
With exquisite watercolors by National Book Critics Circle Award-winner Leanne Shapton throughout, editor Susan Barba has gathered insightful and meaningful writing from contributors including:
- botanists William Bartram, George Washington Carver, and Robin Wall Kimmerer, and horticultural writers Neltje Blanchan and Eleanor Perényi
- essayists Aldo Leopold, Lydia Davis, and Aimee Nezhukumatathil
- poets Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson, William Carlos Williams and T. S. Eliot to Allen Ginsberg and Robert Creeley, Lucille Clifton and Louise Glück, Natalie Diaz and Jericho Brown
Praise
“A luminous selection of essays, poems, and letters that leap and bound through mood, time and place, with writers of every shape and form from America’s foundation years to the present day”Financial Times
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"A sensitive but substantial florilegium of poems, essays, and letters from the 1700s to the present about wildflowers and their place in this world past, present, and future . . . The collection as a whole reminds us how lucky we are to share the world with this variety of shape and color, and to open our eyes to what grows on the side of the highway, between cracks in the sidewalk, along the riverbank."Boston Globe
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“A significant addition to the tradition of writing about plants, this anthology urges us to notice the lessons offered by the tiniest bluet.”Bookpage, *starred* review
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“This anthology offers a rich compendium of classic and contemporary writings inspired by wildflowers . . . a prismatic and dynamic work.”Publishers Weekly
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