People with Dirty Hands: The Passion for Gardening

by Robin Chotzinoff

Overview

There was a wooden picnic table under the grape arbor, where Zelma sat all day when she wasn't actively gardening. She shelled peas, wrote letters, and mended clothes there. The older she got, she said, the less she wanted to be inside. Following Zelma's model, I will age ungracefully until I become an old woman in a small garden, doing whatever the hell I want. There was a time when this would have sounded unfulfilled to me, if not downright depressing, but now I look forward to it. Robin Chotzinoff From the Introduction

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780028609904
Publisher:	Wiley
Publication date:	01/31/1996
Pages:	206
Product dimensions:	6.32(w) x 9.56(h) x 0.76(d)

About the Author

Robin Chotzinoff is a staff writer for Denver's Westword and a contributor to Garden Design magazine, and she has written for New Republic and Outside. She lives with her daughter and her boyfriend in a log cabin outside Denver, where she gardens at 7,000 feet.

Table of Contents

Introduction

1. Rustling Roses

2. Heat

3. Winter: Bugs and Seeds

4. City Dirt

5. Estates

6. Long Island Roots

7. Tomatoes

8. Natives

9. Road Trip: Medicine

10. Road Trip: Three Days in Oregon

11. What People Keep

Acknowledgments

Editorial Reviews

There's no better antidote to the dreary non-gardening months than a great read, and in this gallery of colorful portraits, Chotzinoff, a columnist for Garden Design, delivers one of the most amusing, eclectic gardening books in recent memory. Curiosity led her to some unusual corners of the U.S.-locales as different as a Louisiana bayou, a New Mexico chile farm, an elegant Virginia estate and Manhattan's wild underbelly to name just a few-where she met with diverse and offbeat gardeners to find out what makes them tick. The result is a series of lively and highly entertaining interviews. Her subjects, sensing a kindred spirit in Chotzinoff, prove a winningly chatty group, and the author makes the most of their willingness to run on about their individual passions-be they rustling roses in Texas, collecting heirloom seeds or growing prize-winning giant tomatoes with names like "Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter." Pull the chair up closer to the fire, sit back and enjoy the company. This group is sheer delight. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

"She's got a little Dave Barry, a little Ellen Goodman, a little Marion Winik."-Los Angeles Times Book Review
"Surprisingly, the most interesting parts of the book are not the 'sweaty people' themselves, but Chotzinoff's observations about their pursuits and her own quest."-Rocky Mountain News

From the Publisher