A revised and updated edition of the internationally bestselling classic, originally published in 1999.
Anna Pavord's now-classic, internationally bestselling sensation, The Tulip, is not a gardening book. It is the story of a flower that has driven men mad. Greed, desire, anguish and devotion have all played their part in the development of the tulip from a wildflower of the Asian steppes to the worldwide phenomenon it is today. No other flower carries so much baggage; it charts political upheavals, illuminates social behaviour, mirrors economic booms and busts, plots the ebb and flow of religious persecution.
Why did the tulip dominate so many lives through so many centuries in so many countries? Anna Pavord, a self-confessed tulipomaniac, spent six years looking for answers, roaming through eastern Turkey and Central Asia to tell how a humble wild flower made its way along the Silk Road and eventually took the whole of Western Europe by storm.
Sumptuously illustrated from a wide range of sources, this irresistible volume has become a bible, a unique sourcebook, a universal gift and a joy to all who possess it. This beautifully redesigned edition features a new preface by the author, a revised listing of the best varieties of this incomparable flower to choose for your garden and a reorganised listing of tulip species to reflect the latest thinking by taxonomists.
Anna Pavord is the gardening correspondent for The Independent and the author of widely praised gardening books including Plant Partners and The Border Book. She wrote for the Observer for twenty years, has contributed to Country Life, Elle Decoration and Country Living, and is an associate editor of Gardens Illustrated. For the last thirty years she has lived in Dorset, England where she is currently making a new garden. Constantly experimenting with new combinations of flowers and foliage, she finds it a tremendous source of inspiration.
"A passionate masterpiece"
– Mail on Sunday
"Well-spun and densely detailed [...] A chronicle rather than a gardening book"
– New York Times
"Anna Pavord is the grande dame of that school of British nature writing that is about beautiful things, beautifully written"
– The Times
"Stunning"
– New Yorker
"Ravishing"
– House & Garden