Research Essay: Why Do We Garden? (200 Points) Length: 8-10 pages Check Canvas for Due Dates
( The Task: Craft a thesis that explores and addresses the connections between the following questions: What is a garden (in other words—what makes a garden a garden, what defines it)? Why do we garden (what are we looking for in the art– the pastime, the pleasure, the challenge, the satisfaction, the escape, the sanctuary– of gardening)? Please note that it is absolutely essential that you specifically and thoroughly address and respond to these questions in your essay. In other words, your essay must provide possible answers to BOTH of these questions and show the inherent link between them. If you do not do this or you only do so vaguely, you will not have fulfilled the task. )
Quick List of Assignments Required for the Project (Due Dates for Each Can Be Found on Canvas)
(1) Online Library Skills Workshops (See Canvas for schedule, links and due dates – Upload Badges to Canvas)
(2) Garden Visits (5 points) Upload to Canvas
(3) Garden Supply Stores Visits (5 points) Upload to Canvas
(4) Interviews (5 points) Upload to Canvas
(5) Prospectus (5 points) Upload to Canvas
(7) Annotated Bibliography (10 points) Upload to Canvas
(8) Final Draft (200 points) Upload to Canvas
Many of you more than likely have little or no experience with gardening. This is precisely why you will need to research what gardens are and why many choose to garden (and why many choose to stop gardening). Please keep in mind that you may not end up using all of your research. The advantage of completing all of these tasks is that they will help you to better understand what a garden is and why people garden. To best familiarize you with gardening and prepare you for writing this research essay, you must complete the following steps.
( Step 1. Completing the Online Library Tutorials : Failure to complete them will result in a loss of your entire participation grade (25 points). The required workshops are listed on Canvas, where you will also find a link to the library website where the tutorials are offered (as well as links to upload your badges that prove you completed the workshop). ) ( Step 2. Garden Visits : Visit a minimum of two “kinds” of gardens (a public garden, a friend or acquaintance’s garden, a community garden, your own garden, a radically different kind of garden). As you visit these places, take notes about your observations and ask yourself, based on what you observe, “what a garden is” and “why we garden.” Then write a 3-page informal narrative (basically a free write) that explains how what you saw helps you address these questions (and provide some possible answers). The more detailed and informative your discussion, the more points you will receive. Your task is to begin writing your thoughts about how to answer these questions. Double spaced. Check Canvas for due date . (10 pts) ) ( Step 3. Garden Supply Store Visit : Visit at least one store that sell plants and gardening supplies ( e.g. Sloat Garden Center, Home Depot, Orchard Supply Hardware, a local nursery). As you visit this store (or these stores), take notes about your observations and ask yourself, based on what you observe, “what a garden is” and “why we garden.” Then write a 3-page informal narrative (basically a free write) that explains how what you saw helps you address these questions (and provide some possible answers). For this assignment, also include what you learned from visiting the two different gardens and how visiting a garden supply store has contributed to your further understanding of these questions. Double spaced. Check Canvas for the due date . (10 pts) ) ( Step 4. Interviews : Interview at least three people and ask them “what a garden is” and “why we garden”—as well as any other questions that you think will be relevant to your research. Note: try and talk to people who have gardens or gardening experience. (Hint: interview people at the gardens and garden supply stores that you visit; you can even interview me if you wish!). Then write a 3-page informal narrative (basically a free write) that explains how the answers to your interview questions help you address those questions. For this assignment, also include what you learned from visiting the two different gardens and a garden supply store and how these interviews have contributed to your further understanding of these questions. Double-spaced. Check Canvas for due date . (10 pts) )
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( Step 5. The Prospectus : Sit down and prepare a prospectus that outlines what you intend to research/ write about. Your prospectus should introduce your basic working thesis, the research you intend to pursue, and the basic outline of how you plan to present it. You should already be coming to some conclusions about “what a garden is” & “why we garden” so that you will have something specific to explore. Check Canvas for due date. (5 pts) You are not bound to your prospectus. You are allowed to change your mind. However, if you do change your mind / direction significantly, please submit a new prospectus for my approval. Your prospectus must be more specific than, “I plan to do research and find out why people garden and what a garden is.” I am looking for the specific direction and an outline of at least several things you wish to research. )
( Step 6. Do Your Research Keeping in mind your specific focus, research everything you can about Gardens ( e.g. their history, practices, garden styles) Reasons why people garden ( e.g. spiritual, practical, relaxation, challenges, etc.) The specific direction you have chosen to research Note : You are required to use and quote William Fitzgerald’s “The Impermanence of Order,” Jim Nollman’s “The How-To Garden,” and Michael Pollan’s “Gardening Means War.” Note : You must find and use a minimum of six additional sources. Two of those sources may come from Internet sites, but the other four must come from printed sources. However, if your source was originally a printed source but has since been stored electronically online, then you may use that source (for example, articles, essays or books found through an online database). Note : The best approach for a research project is to gather more information than you need for the essay. Your goal is to find a substantial amount of research to draw from while writing your essay. Also keep in mind, that you will not necessarily find sources that specifically address these questions. You will need to process and think critically about the information you find and ask yourself how your research can help you address the questions of what a garden is and why we do it. Note : As you work on your research, you don’t need to know exactly what you are going to write about, but you should have a general goal. Think of the research portion of this essay as an opportunity to let your experiences and observations help you figure out what you later want to write about. However, everything you gather and think about should be focused on answering the questions put forth in this prompt: “what a garden is” and “why we garden.” ) ( Step 8. Annotated Bibliography : List the sources you will be using for your essay. Do not number the sources. You must follow all the MLA formatting rules for biographical citations (see the course reader for correct formatting and a sample annotated bibliography). Check Canvas for the due date. 10pts. Below each citation, you must provide a short summary of what, overall, the source is about and how you intend to use that source. Your summary must be very, very, very specific. I am not looking for generalizations. Make sure that the summary of the source is on a different line than the citation itself (refer to the sample annotated bibliography in the course reader). Remember: you need a total of 9 sources: (1) Michael Pollan’s “Gardening Means War,” (2) William Fitzgerald’s “The Impermanence of Order,” and (3) Jim Nollman’s “The How-To Garden” PLUS six additional source s that you find via research. Of those six additional sources, two may come from Internet sites, but the other four must come from printed sources. However, if your source was originally a printed source but has since been stored electronically online, then you may use that source (for example, articles, essays or books found through an online database). For the articles in this course reader, use this reader as your source (use the page numbers from this reader). For example (note the exact formatting): Fitzgerald, William. “The Impermanence of Order: The True Nature of Gardens.” English 1A Course Reader. Edited by Nathan Wirth, Nathan’s Mind Inc., 2019. )
Things That You Must Do/Remember (Check this List Before You Are Ready to Upload Your Final Draft)
1) Your essay must follow the requirements listed in this prompt and respond to the questions asked in the task (What is a Garden? / Why do we Garden?). If you go way off topic or do not address the questions, your essay will not be successful.
2) Important: this is not an essay about your experiences visiting gardens and stores to gather information; rather, it is an essay that explains what a garden is and why we garden— nor is it a personal essay about why you like or don’t like gardening (or even what you, personally, think about gardening). To that end, you are not allowed to use “I” in the essay (or “you”).
3) As we will have discussed in class, your essay is not a dumping ground for quotations. Keep in mind our discussions about using research to meaningfully contribute to the discussion in your essay (use your sources to support points, to address ideas and possibilities, to provide valuable insights for answering these questions, etc.). Remember our class discussions about providing context for the sources that you use. Many students, over the years, have told me in their process letters that they struggled to find sources that agree with and/or support their ideas and points. This is not the correct approach to a research essay. You are supposed to learn from your research; in other words, your research should lead you to new insights and help you shape your responses to these questions.
4) You must write a minimum of eight full, complete pages and no more than twelve. Essays that do not reach the required minimum might receive less points and / or not receive a passing grade.
5) You must include a formal, properly formatted works cited page ( do not use your annotated bibliography ). Make sure that you also follow all of the proper MLA formatting for in-text citations. If you have many MLA errors and / or no works cited page, I will have to reduce your grade, so make sure that you take the time to properly format your in-text citations / works cited page.
SAMPLE PROSPECTUS
( Miley Cyrus English 1A Prospectus for Gardening Research Paper Prospectus I am going to explore the idea that a garden only maintains its shape as long as one does the upkeep. This reality, in my opinion, defines a garden. No matter what kind of design one chooses, that design will only last if you do the work necessary to preserve it. Furthermore, I want to explore the idea that many of us garden because we love the challenge of that upkeep. Many of us also garden because even though it is very hard work, we find it peaceful and rewarding—even spiritual. In order to explore these ideas, I plan to research several different kinds of gardens. The formal English garden. The Zen Garden Natural Gardens Guerilla Gardening By looking at the differences between these garden styles, I plan to discuss how the different designs and approaches reveal the various ways we shape the garden. These gardens range from rigid designs to random seed dispersion, but all of them reflect the intention and desire of the “gardener.” Why does the gardener wish to pursue any of these? What satisfaction does she get from all the hard work? Finding answers to these questions should help me better understand how these different styles appeal to different people. Furthermore, I plan to explore how these designs help us to understand what a garden is— and how these designs reflect our desire to “control” and “shape” nature (knowing full well that it will last only as long as we put the work in). )
SAMPLE ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY (Follow the Formatting EXACTLY)
Miley Cyrus English 1A
Annotated Bibliography for Gardening Research Paper
Kunitz, Stanley. The Wild Braid: A Poet Reflects on a Century in the Garden. Norton, 2005.
Kunitz’s book explores his love for gardening and how it has shaped his attention to poetry. His book reflects the gardener who has become very old and knows that he will soon die and that his garden will not likely last once he is gone. I plan to use this to help support the spiritual benefits of gardening.
Pollan, Michael. Second Nature: A Gardener’s Education. Grove, 1991. Pollan explores the gardener’s almost intimate relationship with nature. The various essays in the book reflect his successes and his many failures with gardening. He considers the ways that the garden permits us to study wilderness while at the same time admitting the folly of our desire to control it. I think Pollan’s book will be very useful for supporting my discussions about the gardener’s desire to control nature—and the likely inevitably that we will ultimately fail.
Yamaguchi, Akira. “The Essence of Nature and Spirit in the Placing of Stones.” Sacred Space: The Art of the Zen Garden. Vintage, 1978. Yamaguchi discusses the spiritual aesthetics of the Zen garden by exploring how it reflects nature. I plan to use this source to show that even though the rock garden typically has few or no plants, it requires a significant amount of maintenance.
Furthermore, the typical Zen gardener continually changes and moves around the elements of the garden while also accepting that nature will inevitably undo his patterns and designs.
Spiritual at their core, these gardens reflect a gardener’s perception of nature.
Zucher, Brown. “The Free Form Garden: Beyond Tradition.” Gardening, 24 Jan 72, pp 29-38.
Throughout much of the article, Zucher argues that the free form garden offers the perfect opportunity for someone to watch nature freely form in the confines of the garden, but he also recognizes that even though this kind of garden is random, it still reflects some kind of intention by the gardener. I think this will be very helpful for my thesis that gardening is very significantly bound to the intent of the gardener.
Sample Outline for Research Essay
I. Introduction (could be more than one paragraph)
A. Establish the questions
1. What is a garden? and Why do we garden?
B. Ponder possible answers
1. The idea is to possible ways that we might consider what a garden is and why we do it
C. Thesis: Your specific response to the questions (DO NOT USE … People garden for many different reasons and gardens mean different things to different people or In this essay I will explore the different ways / reasons, etc. INSTEAD, BE SPECIFIC … MAKE A CLAIM)
II. Rose Gardens (could easily be more than one paragraph)
A. Provide a transition from the introduction / thesis that shows / explains to your reader why considering different garden styles will help answer these questions.
B. Describe, specifically, what a rose garden is
1. What are its various elements?
a) Order? / Structure? / Formal?
2. Rules / Requirements
C. Why do people choose to cultivate a rose garden?
1. This should be various things – each of which helps to explain why / what
D. Your conclusions about how your discussion of a rose garden answers the questions why people garden / what a garden is.
III. Natural Gardens (could easily be more than one paragraph)
A. Provide a transition from the previous paragraph(s) about Rose Gardens. Something that picks up off of the conclusion about what makes a rose garden a rose garden and how this relates to why people garden / what a garden is.
B. Describe, specifically, what a natural garden is
1. What are its various elements?
a) Order? / Structure? / Formal?
2. Rules / Requirements
C. Why do people choose to cultivate a natural garden as opposed to a more traditional garden?
1. This should be various things – each of which helps to explain why / what
D. Your conclusions about how your discussion of a natural garden design answers the questions why people garden / what a garden is.
IV. You should draw some conclusions about how your discussion of the two garden forms so far helps us to understand what a garden is and why we garden. Think of this as an opportunity to give relevance to your discussions of the two garden forms.
A. Take some time to consider how they are different but only do this so that you can consider what is similar about them.
B. From these conclusions, transition into the next garden form.
V. Zen Gardens (could easily be more than one paragraph)
A. Provide a transition from the previous paragraph to this third garden style. How is it different from the other two – but is still similar and how does it help us to understand why people garden / what a garden is.
B. Describe, specifically, what a Zen garden is
1. What are its various elements?
i. Order? / Structure? / Formal? / symbolism?
2. Rules / Requirements
C. Why do people choose to cultivate a Zen garden?
1. This should be various things – each of which helps to explain why / what
D. Your conclusions about how your discussion of a Zen garden answers the questions why people garden / what a garden is.
VI. Conclusion (could easily be more than one paragraph)
A. What the various styles / forms considered together tell us about what a garden is
1. How those differences still help us to understand how / why / what
2. How, despite their differences they all help us to understand how/ why / what
B. What, ultimately, are your responses to the questions?
1. What is a garden?
2. Why do people garden?
Please keep in mind that this is only an example, one that serves the purpose of providing a means for discussion about structure
/ transitions / etc. There are many different ways that you could organize / discuss / research / consider your responses to the task set forth in the essay prompt. In other words, you can use this outline, but you are not required to follow this direction.
The Impermanence of Order: The True Nature of Gardens by William Fitzgerald
Gardening is not a rational act.
– Margaret Atwood –
The earliest evidence of gardening takes civilization back to the symmetrical rows of acacia and palms found in 15th century B.C. Egyptian tomb paintings; in fact, even the most perfunctory survey of gardening throughout its long history reveals an attention to symmetry— a conclusion that suggests a significant element of gardening is grounded in the aesthetic and practical desire to bring order to things. The poet Stanley Kunitz wrote that “the garden is a domestication of the wild, taking what can be random and, to a degree, ordering it so that it is not merely a transference from the wild” (13). Kunitz’s observation emphasizes that gardening is not just a happenstance practice of transferring a perennial, a shrub, or a tree from one part of nature to another, but, rather, a planned act— one that reminds us that this ordering can only be accomplished “to a degree,” that the design, the shape, of a garden can be as formal as the gardens of Versailles or as haphazard as randomly disseminating seeds into a backyard and waiting to see what happens. In other words, even the most disorganized, seemingly random garden reflects some form of human instrumentality, some act of creation. As a result, gardens— like almost any creative endeavor— represent and reflect the human struggle to bring harmony to disorder, that order, in this case, being the manipulation of nature. This is, perhaps, what most significantly differentiates the garden from the wild. Indeed, in the end, the gardener, wishing, perhaps, to play God, to be a creator, imposes his own sense of order onto a world of randomness, but that same world will reclaim any effort he has made to shape it as soon as he loses interest in the back-breaking labor it takes to sustain that often creative imposition.
Anyone who wants to create a garden has a plan, some kind of design— even those who want to develop something decidedly un-garden-like. Indeed, even the goal of making a garden as “un-gardenly” as possible requires at least some thought, some purposeful act. Most gardeners, however, have a specific design in mind, and typically both the seasoned and would-be gardener shapes their patch of land in organized clusters of rows, circles, rectangles, triangles and squares. Humans tend to be naturally drawn to the beauty of symmetry, and while one might argue that the symmetry of a garden stands in direct contrast to the randomness of the wild, making it almost the opposite of what nature intends, such an observation fails to recognize how we see nature. At the very least, if one looks more closely, one sees such beauty and balance in the shape of a leaf, in the curve of a trunk, in a splash of color, and even in the fragmented oval shape of a pond of water after heavy rainfall. The symmetry we so relish comes from nature itself, from those places and moments where the shapes and curves of mountains, rivers, and trees seem almost planned by human intervention or a benevolent being that shares our love for the potential harmony of order. But it is equally important to recognize that even though we first recognized this sense of symmetry in nature, we, through the language of experience, impose our sense of symmetry onto nature. A shrub does not know it grows in a conical shape, or that it spreads across the ground like a carpet, nor does a flower know that it has a bulbous shape or that its oval splotches of purple balance perfectly with its white petals. These observations, as well as our language of understanding them as such, belong only to us— and the garden, in a sense, reflects our desire to recreate that same symmetry however we see fit.
So, on the one hand, the design of a garden reflects the way we see nature, but, on the other, it is entirely an illusion. A garden only retains the shape that we impose on it for as long as we are willing to sustain that imposition. One might take this thought a step further, as Michael Pollan does in his book Second Nature, and recognize that nature will eventually reclaim anything that we create. As he takes a walk in the woods near his house, Pollan, who is in a battle with the inevitable forces of animals and pests that want to eat the vegetation of his garden, realizes that “every weed I pulled, every blade of grass I mowed, each beetle I crushed— all was done to slow the advance of the forest” (46). Pollan comes to this conclusion after he discovers that these woods have reclaimed what used to be an agricultural village— and through this experience he realizes that the forest is what is normal, and that “the lawns and pavements and, most spectacularly, the gardens” are an “ecological vacuum that nature will not abide for long” (46). Indeed, if nature itself is a constant reminder of the impermanence of things, then the garden serves as a profound reminder that any human attempt to force purpose or design upon it only ends in its eventual reclamation.
If nature is an inevitable force of reclamation, then how does one stall this affront long enough to sustain the aesthetic shape of the garden—no matter how illusionary and impermanent it may be? The obvious answer should be: through hard, back breaking work. Indeed, the design and purpose of nature,
if we choose to anthropomorphize it as such, is to grow, evolve and survive, a process that consumes and recycles everything in its path. Nature is not concerned about death or destruction or preservation.
Death, destruction, famine, floods, fire, and extinction are nature— just as aphids, snails, gophers and blights are nature. Such forces are, after all, merely doing what they do. We, in the end, are the ones that are working against the natural flow of things. Pollan suggests that a garden is “a place that is at once of nature and unapologetically set against it,” an observation that cautions the gardener to be aware he is cultivating something impermanent (53). The poet Robert Frost once famously wrote, in his poem “Nothing Gold Can Stay,” that “Nature’s first green is gold / Her hardest hue to hold” (1-2). Frost’s poem reveals the melancholy beauty of the transience of nature, and life itself, through these fleeting flashes of brilliance found in the first budding leaves of early spring, which begin to fade as soon as they have opened. The gardener lives for those mere hours before “leaf subsides to leaf,” and knows that the measure of the seasons brings blistering cold, searing heat, flooding rains and generous measures of light and life-giving drops of rain. Eleanor Perényi, in her book Green Thoughts, cautions that “the seasons can’t be rushed, or halted” (68). The would-be gardener who does not understand these subtleties soon learns that he must learn them because— if one wants to play god and shape their own slice of nature— there are rules, rules that even the seasoned gardener looking for a risk or two cannot always overcome.
One might argue that nature, in all of its randomness, has no rules or that, even if it does have them, those rules often change on a whim, but when one imposes design, shape, and symmetry onto nature, one, as Pollan suggests, is doing something that is “unapologetically set against” nature (46). In other words, if one seeks the beauty found in the folds of a rose, one must realize that (a) one will not be rewarded with those fragrant swirls of petals until the summer and (b) one should not plant a rose in a rainy climate because the moisture will lead to mildewed leaves. If a gardener loves the brilliant explosion of leafless flowers on a cherry tree, he will only witness them in the early weeks of spring. If a gardener wants a beautiful showy garden of petunias, violets, zinnias, snapdragons and daisies he cannot plant them in the sand outside a beach house. And, perhaps most importantly, whatever a gardener wants in a garden, it will not survive without water— which often means he must bring the water to the garden (as well as sometimes having to figure out a way to channel the excess water out of the garden). In the “real world” of nature, plants develop to particular kinds of soil, frequencies of rainfall, and exposure to light— so one might well think that all one needs to do is to choose the plants that best match the soil and climate of one’s little patch of earth. Many gardeners, however, often want what they want when they want it and where they want it, so, if one wishes to experiment, one must know at least something about each plant’s limitations.
And where does one find this knowledge: books, magazines, websites, garden nurseries, friends who garden, professional gardeners? All these equally helpful sources are part of a culture’s folklore, a rich history of tips and methods culled from centuries of gardening. As Noel Kingsbury, author of The New Perennial Garden, points out, whatever “the exact nature of a particular natural garden” might be, “it is almost inevitably managed in some way; in other words, it is still a cultural artifact” (102). Kingsbury is writing specifically about the natural garden, a style of gardening that involves much less human intervention than more formal gardens, but his observation applies to all gardens. In other words, anyone who gardens takes part in a cultural act that has a long and varied tradition— regardless of whether they are planting a small vegetable patch, creating the splashes of color found in a cottage garden, or planting flowers and trees in plastic tubs in a back alley in a poor neighborhood— a tradition that stretches even further back than those 15th Century B.C. Egyptian tomb painting and as far forward as gardens created by the homeless in New York slums.
In his book Gardens: An Essay on the Human Condition, Robert Pogue Harrison, an Italian literature professor at Stanford University, writes about his fascination with these New York slum gardens, which are made up of objects and items found in the streets, things that might be thought of as garbage by most. What fascinates him, however, is not the fact that this kind of garden stretches our idea of what a garden is or can be, but that it asks questions about what motivates these people, who have virtually nothing, to spend so much of their time and effort finding and arranging items when none of it helps them with the basics of surviving (42). At the very least, they are motivated, as most gardeners are, to create, to “express, fashion and beautify,” a kind of self-expression that Harrison reminds us is “a basic human urge” (42). This spark of creativity, this desire to create, to design, to shape, is part of what sets gardening apart from farming. Indeed, no one actually knows which came first, but conventional theories suggest that gardening is either a creative response to farming or a kind of prototype for agriculture.
Harrison, however, argues that one could just as easily recognize that the earliest primitive gardens were created for ritual purposes, citing the “fundamental” craving “in human beings to transfigure reality, to adorn it with costume and illusion, and thereby to respiritualize our experience of it” (40). Harrison’s
observation reminds us that the garden can be a cultural expression of art, one that not only reflects the creativity, skills, and vision of its creator, but also the visitor’s appreciation of and desire for beauty, symmetry, and harmony. And it is this creative spark that often draws both creator and appreciator to the garden.
Even a superficial consideration of writings about gardening reveals that many gardeners and garden visitors are looking for such seemingly disparate experiences as escape, solitude, purpose, peace, spiritual grounding, pride, privacy, control, blessings, freedom, self-expression, silence, and a communal relationship with nature. All of these suggest something entirely self-absorbed about the experience of either creating or visiting a garden. We often want to be alone with our thoughts as we soak in the beauty or to escape from our worries as we bury ourselves in the labor of cultivation. Indeed, many gardeners simply want the escape from their daily lives and obligations and, instead, embrace the opportunity to be alone with soiled hands and knees. However, many people have a garden simply because they want to impress others, some even hoping to earn bragging rights. In this light, many gardeners strive not only for their own sense of perfection but what they think others see as perfection. Often this need to “show off” applies to those who hire gardeners and designers to create something for them. Indeed, gardening is not for the lazy, for it requires constant maintenance and many are unwilling or unable to commit to such an enterprise. Anyone who has tried to plant a garden and then given up can attest to both the frustration and inevitability of how easily and quickly plants and shrubs resist your will to shape them to your vision. Perhaps even more curious is the fact that many home owners feel culturally obligated to have a garden because that is what is expected of a homeowner (many neighborhood associations even require homeowners to have a well-kept, well-manicured garden lawn in front of their homes). In the end, the reasons for planting and creating one, or simply having it all done by someone else, are as varied as the many different styles of gardens and flora to choose from.
So, why then do people garden? Whatever the exact answer to that question might be, its possible answers are inextricably bound to what makes a garden a garden, a question that also has a myriad of possible answers. At the very least, gardening continues to be as popular as ever, evidenced by the multi-billion-dollar industry that has grown around it, a thriving industry that offers the tools, materials, and cultural expectations that every seasoned and newbie gardener could ever possibly need. Furthermore, every style, every garden form, has its own jargon, its own books, its own tools, its own styles. For example, a traditional English garden features very formal elements such as a graveled walkway, a birdbath or gazebo, and organized beds of flowers. The traditional rose garden showcases one’s favorite, prize roses in order to highlight their various colorful and fragrant qualities. In fact, many gardens simply highlight various colors and fragrances and various shapes and symmetries organized to be visually appealing— sometimes very symmetrically and other times somewhat haphazardly. Some gardeners specifically design their creations to attract desired visitors such as hummingbirds and butterflies. Some disperse seeds with reckless abandon and wait to see what springs from the ground.
Some people grow food. Some only garden in containers placed on apartment decks because they have no other space. Others garden inside, bringing tropical plants into their various rooms. Others turn to decidedly very un-garden-like styles such as Zen gardens, which typically eschew plants in favor of organized rocks and raked patterns in the sand that, symbolically, reflect the forces and shapes of the larger natural world. One can even see something very gardenlike in a single bonsai, a miniature tree that has been carefully shaped and cultivated in a small pot or tray.
Gardens also stretch beyond the cultivators and designers to the garden visitor, thus allowing one to include public parks, which people can wander around in or simply sit and relax, and community gardens, which provide urban gardeners with no space of their own to plant food and flowers. Many prisons have gardening programs so that inmates can learn the value and satisfaction of hard work while also producing something they can eat (also serving as a system to reward good behavior). Guerilla gardeners sneak into private property, often abandoned, and plant a garden as a political statement that seeks to question the neglect and misuse of that property. Each of these— even though they take us away from the garden as a home-based endeavor— are still bound to ideas of cultivation, order, and intent, three very specific elements that clearly help us to understand what a garden is and why so many do it. Indeed, to cultivate is to work and prepare the land, which both gardeners and farmers do. Indeed, to plant is to labor. Both farmers and gardeners order, or organize, the plants; however, farmers tend to limit such organization to even rows so that they can easily harvest their crops. Consequently, even though farms are bound to a kind of symmetry, the intent of such order and structure is purely to yield a product for profit in the most efficient way possible. Gardeners, on the other hand, typically seek symmetry as a creative act, one that can be bound to an artistic-like vision or simply just the desire to plant something of one’s own, to create something from seemingly nothing. In the end, one can argue
incessantly about whether gardens and farms are really all that different, neither side of the argument ever offering anything entirely conclusive or undebatable. Nevertheless, much of gardening is bound to aesthetics and personal satisfaction and goals— and on a dramatically smaller scale than farming, which is far more associated with commercial activity practiced on large tracts of land. If we boil down everything discussed in this essay, we see that the typical gardener seeks something personal— the typical garden occupying a limited space that is manipulated and ordered to some specific end. And while the circumstances and intentions are as varied as the possible styles and approaches, all of them are bound to some form of expression or purpose, one that often fulfills a specific goal or vision.
So, ultimately, what exactly is a garden? Is it merely a matter of: it all depends on what one cultivates, where one cultivates, how one cultivates, and why one cultivates? Simply stated: a garden can be planted for various reasons, cultivated and ordered in a variety of styles, but all of it, in the end, is merely an illusion of order imposed on the chaos of nature, for no matter how or why or what one plants, such an imposition of structure and order can only last if one invests the time and work into cultivating such an illusion. This, however, does little to stop anyone who wishes to garden from gardening, for such is the very essence of all gardens and the act of gardening itself. In fact, if one wished to be so bold, one might very well conclude that the act of cultivating something that cannot, ultimately, last— something that is inevitably fated to one day be reclaimed by the very nature that a garden reflects, something whose success is subject to the whims and stresses of our busy lives— curiously mirrors the very fact of the impermanence of our own lives. Therefore, one might conclude that we garden because we wish to shape our surroundings for as long as we remain alive.
Basic Outline of “The Impermanence of Order” (What is a Garden? | Why do we garden?)
I. Introduction Question(s) Addressed
A. Gardens have been bound to symmetry since their inception What is a Garden?
1. Symmetry comes from appreciation of / the desire to organize things What is a Garden?
B. Symmetry is designed What is a Garden?
1. Such design is related to our desire to create Why do we garden?
2. Symmetry is related to our desire to bring harmony to dis order Why do we garden?
Thesis: By gardening, we impose order on that which cannot retain order. Both questions.
Note: The first paragraph introduces the reader to the main focus of the essay: that gardens, in general, are creative expressions of symmetry and order in the face of the reality that this order is imposed and will not last unless one does the necessary upkeep to sustain that shape, that imposition. Moreover, gardeners wish to bring harmony to disorder–all of which serves as an introduction to not only the overall essay and eventual conclusion but also, quite specificall, in this paragraph, the thesis. (This is the real purpose of an introduction).
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II. Garden Design and Symmetry Question(s) Addressed
A. All gardeners have a design / plan What is a Garden?
B. Symmetry comes from nature What is a Garden?
C. We recreate that symmetry found in nature What is a Garden?
Note: The first body paragraph builds off the thesis and introduction by furthering the discussion about how most gardens are based on designs … and that many of those designs are based in symmetry, which comes from our perceptions, fully realized or not, of the shapes found in nature.
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III. Garden Design / Shape is an Illusion Question(s) Addressed
A. Shape is only retained if we do the upkeep What is a Garden?
B. Pollan story about Dudleytown What is a Garden?
1. Illustrates how nature reclaims anything we design / plant What is a Garden?
Note: This paragraph connects to the previous paragraph by transitioning into the fundamental fact that the imposed shape and design of a garden will only last as long as its upkeep. Pollan’s story of encountering Dudleytown illustrates this point, followed by an explanation for why that illustration is relevant.
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