Strange Blooms

Book excerpt: Now in paperback, this beautifully written and gorgeously produced book describes the remarkable lives and times of the John Tradescants, father and son. In 17th-century Britain, a new breed of "curious" gardeners was pushing at the frontiers of knowledge and new plants were stealing into Europe from East and West. John Tradescant and his son were at the vanguard of this change—as gardeners, as collectors, and above all as exemplars of an age that began in wonder and ended with the dawning of science. Meticulously researched and vividly evoking the drama of their lives, this book takes readers to the edge of an expanding universe, and is a magnificent pleasure for gardeners and non-gardeners alike.