Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 29
 Wonderful picture of a garden November 17, 2009
SWK (East Bay, CA USA)
This is a book I wish I'd caught earlier - written in the late 80's, it displays the kind of writing that made Pollan famous. The combination of history, garden information, and good writing makes it a pleasure to follow Pollan's development of his property and his understanding of what makes his work 'gardening.'
I see gardens and landscaping differently after reading this book.
 Second Nature: A Gardener's Education October 15, 2009
OldRoses (NJ)
My first exposure to Michael Pollan's writing was an article in the New York Times Magazine. I loved his writing style and his point of view. He made me think about the environment in ways that were totally new to me. I love those "aha" moments. Those "why didn't I think of that?" moments. And then my outlook on life and the world around me is subtly altered.
So it was with great anticipation that I oopened my copy of "Second Nature: A Gardener's Education". Michael Pollan on gardening. It doesn't get much better than that, right? Well, um, actually it does. I was expecting a completely new perspective on gardening. What I got was just another memoir of a beginning gardener. Admittedly, he does tell much more entertaining stories than most garden memoirists. No one who reads this book will ever forget his monumental battles with a woodchuck culminating in an attempt at incineration that very nearly incinerated the garden. Hilarious, but still quite ordinary. Can you think of a single garden memoir that doesn't contain a battle with a woodchuck? Just as Hollywood screenwriters use a predictable formula for their storylines, garden memoirists all stick to the same, tired outline: How I started gardening. How I made all the newbie mistakes my first year. How I tried to correct them. How I learned the "right" way to garden.
Disappointed, I soldiered on until Chapter 10 when I finally had the hoped for "why didn't I think of that?" moment. The story of the restoration of a woodland area in his town that had been destroyed by a tornado morphs into a discussion of restoration vs replacement vs allowing Nature to take its course and all of the consequences, intended and unintended, that could happen for each option. Now this is a book that I would like to read. The question of what time period a restoration should mimic is particularly intriguing. Colonial, after changes made by European settlers? Pre-Columbian? Taking into account the fact that the indigenous population also had a significant impact on the local ecology, should the area be restored to the state it was before the Native Americans arrived? These are questions that have never occurred to me when thinking about our altered landscape.
Ideally, I would have liked to see the "memoir" part of the book excised and this topic expanded. Where else in the US or even the world has this issue been addressed? What decisions were made and why? Was global warming taken into account? What provisions were made for non-native plant and animal introductions?
And then the book reverts right back to the standard memoir. The last two chapters are the obligatory catalog survey and "What my garden looks like now". Yawn.
I'm looking forward to reading more of Michael Pollan's books and his unique perspective. Even if it is only one or two chapters that grab me, they will be well worth it.
 Toni's Gifts September 27, 2009
Leslie R. Woods (Atlanta, GA)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Another item I ordered for my partner's birthday. She is a beginning gardner and I hoped this would help her along. I have seen utube video with Michael Pollan and have loved the way he delivers his information.
Pollans least interesting work September 4, 2009
Colin Povey (Clearwater, FL, USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I have read most of Michael Pollans books. I think 'The Omnivores Dilemma' is a five-star plus book that should be mandatory reading for everyone who eats, and 'In Defense of Food' is almost as good.
In this book, Michael talks about his efforts at gardening, both vegetables and ornamental plants. However, this book disappoints. It is too vague, with few concrete examples to back up his assertions. It seems that Michael is a better writer about other peoples efforts at producing food than he is on his own efforts.
From Napalm to Seed Catalogs January 25, 2009
WILLIAM H FULLER (SPEARFISH, SD USA)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
SECOND NATURE is not your normal gardening book. There aren't a lot of "how to" instructions here for planting, nurturing and harvesting. There are, however, innumerable more important things here.
Pollan takes his reader on a journey of discovery, asking cogent questions about man's relationship to nature, about the proper way to conserve wilderness, about the social strata of contemporary seed catalogs, about the best way to design a garden to achieve our spiritual goals (although his way of expressing it isn't nearly as hokey-sounding as my wording), about the sexual metaphors of roses, about the quasi-religious movement of composting, and about the historical evolution in the way we have looked at trees.
His writing is often humorous as well as something most of us can relate to in our own experiences. In his early battles with garden-eating rodents, his ill-considered attempt to napalm a woodchuck makes for absolutely hilarious reading, and the story of his father's rebellion against the neighbors' edict that he mow his lawn is exhilarating. Throughout much of the book, we do, however, come to learn a serious lesson. The realistic gardener does not attempt to subdue nature nor to surrender to it, but to work with nature as a part of it, to be realistic in determining what can and cannot be accomplished, and to influence rather than conquer (especially since conquering is not really possible after all).
For both the neophyte and the experienced gardener, SECOND NATURE is probably more important and useful than a "how to" book for it will reveal the overarching philosophy that drives the gardener's actions. For the suburbanite whose gardening is pretty much limited to manicuring his portion of The Great American Lawn and planting a few decorative shrubs here and there, it is utterly indispensable for it will reveal the shallow artificiality of such kowtowing to social "propriety."
Pollan's lessons are painless. He never preaches. He never rants. He never proselytizes. His writing is both humorous and instructive. It unveils historical trends in man's relationship toward gardens, wildlands, and lawns that most readers, with our limited visions of life in the 17th and 18th centuries, never suspected. Most importantly, the reader finishes his book with a genuinely new appreciation of man's place in nature, with an understanding that it is okay to make his mark upon nature (because he is part of it), and with the knowledge of how to make that mark positive, non-destructive, and productive.
I heartedly recommend SECOND NATRURE to everyone who has ever planted a garden (productively or otherwise), who has ever thought about planting a garden, who has ever mowed a lawn, who has ever wondered about the best methods of protecting wilderness areas, who has ever written a letter in support of or opposition to environmental activists, or who, though city-bound and surrounded by asphalt, has ever wondered about man's proper place on the earth. SECOND NATURE has, if not universal, then at least very widespread appeal to all sorts of readers.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 29
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