My Garden in the Wilderness

This 1915 account of gardening in the remote north-east of the subcontinent is both enjoyable and evocative of imperial India.

Kathleen L. Murray (Author)

9781108076708, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 19 February 2016

202 pages, 77 b/w illus.
21.8 x 14 x 1.4 cm, 0.28 kg

This story of an Indian garden was published in 1915. Its author, Kathleen L. Murray, was living in the remote north-eastern region of Bihar in the home of her brother, an indigo producer, and some of her musings on life and gardening in India had already been published in the periodical The Statesman. She viewed this work not as a guide, but 'merely a rambling record of some years in a garden' which combined European plants such as roses and sweet peas with natives such as cannas and beaumontias. Along with her gardening successes and failures over three years, the book provides insights into the life of the European woman in India - with no employment, and required to be both idle and aloof from the lives of the wider population. Murray's descriptive powers and enthusiasm for her garden make this book both enjoyable and evocative of imperial India.

Introduction
Part I: Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Part II. First Year in the New Garden: Chapter 6: May
Chapter 7: July
Chapter 8: August
Chapter 9: October
Chapter 10: November
Second Year in the Garden: Chapter 11: April
Chapter 12: May
Chapter 13: July
Chapter 14: September
Chapter 15: October
Chapter 16: November
Part III. Third Year in the Garden: Chapter 17: January
Chapter 18: February
Chapter 19: April
Chapter 20: The last June.

Subject Areas: Environmental management [RNF]