A Rage for Rock Gardening: The Story of Reginald Farrer, Gardener, Writer & Plant Collector Book

"Dwarfish and intense, Reginald Farrer (1880-1920) spent an isolated, privileged childhood climbing the limestone cliffs of his native Yorkshire, collecting the delicate alpine plants that grew there in profusion. By age eight he knew their names and anatomy, and by thirteen had published his first discoveries in the Journal of Botany." He went up to Oxford with a world-beating attitude and a vain, abiding dream of becoming a great novelist. Instead he became the foremost garden writer of his generation, a wit, taste-maker, and flamboyant iconoclast who, through his best-selling books, almost single-handedly "democratized" gardening, transforming it from an indulgence of the rich to a passion of millions. He was also an intrepid plant collector, mounting expeditions to China, Tibet, and Upper Burma and introducing many important new species to the gardens of the West. It is no exaggeration to call him the father of modern flower gardening, the man who put garden books in every Englishman's library and a rockery in every backyard.

The New York Times - Verlyn Klinkenborg

One of the most wickedly enjoyable gardening books of this season is Nicola Shulman's brief, scintillating portrait of another imperfect genius, Reginald Farrer, in A Rage for Rock Gardening.