For many, the
concept of a literary garden evokes William Shakespeare and a sweet-perfumed floral
arrangement of rosemary, violets, lilies and roses that find fond mention in
the Bard’s works. No great surprise then, Shakespeare Gardens can be found all
over the world with some landscaped in the style popular during his lifetime,
while some, a riot of flowers, herbs and other botanicals. We take you to a
few…
By Raul Dias
“I
know a bank where the wild thyme blows
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine.”
—A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine.”
—A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Shakespeare’s
Flowers at the Golden Gate Park, San Francisco
The Golden Gate Park is a mammoth, urban park consisting of 1,017 acres of public grounds with everything from a well-appointed Japanese Tea Garden to hosting the San Francisco Botanical Garden at Strybing Arboretum. But neatly tucked away at the intersection of the garden’s Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and Middle Drive East is a fecund spot with a sundial at its dead centre. Simply called Shakespeare’s Flowers, this Shakespeare Garden was planted in 1928 under the patronage of Alice Eastwood, the then director of botany for the Academy of Sciences. With over 200 flowers and plants lining this modest-sized garden, visitors can find visual, floral references to the Bard’s staggering body of work. Here, bronze plagues are engraved with notable quotations from his historic comedies, tragedies, and sonnets that accompany the floral arrangements.
Entry: Free
The Golden Gate Park is a mammoth, urban park consisting of 1,017 acres of public grounds with everything from a well-appointed Japanese Tea Garden to hosting the San Francisco Botanical Garden at Strybing Arboretum. But neatly tucked away at the intersection of the garden’s Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and Middle Drive East is a fecund spot with a sundial at its dead centre. Simply called Shakespeare’s Flowers, this Shakespeare Garden was planted in 1928 under the patronage of Alice Eastwood, the then director of botany for the Academy of Sciences. With over 200 flowers and plants lining this modest-sized garden, visitors can find visual, floral references to the Bard’s staggering body of work. Here, bronze plagues are engraved with notable quotations from his historic comedies, tragedies, and sonnets that accompany the floral arrangements.
Entry: Free
The
Shakespeare Park
at Herzogspark, Regensburg
Germany’s south-eastern city of Regensburg in Bavaria is famous for its location, as it is situated at the confluence of the Danube, Naab and Regen rivers. But its greatest calling card to a die-hard Shakespeare fan is the Herzogpark—a tiny, municipal park with an even smaller botanical garden dedicated to William Shakespeare. The Shakespeare Park is designed as an alpine garden meets Renaissance garden, replete with bell flowers, carnations, primroses, and rhododendrons, besides of course, a rose garden. Set in the Renaissance style of geometric parterres edged by boxwood hedges, the Shakespeare Park is a peaceful nook where you can almost always find someone sitting on one its low, stone benches, engrossed in a book.
Entry: Free
Germany’s south-eastern city of Regensburg in Bavaria is famous for its location, as it is situated at the confluence of the Danube, Naab and Regen rivers. But its greatest calling card to a die-hard Shakespeare fan is the Herzogpark—a tiny, municipal park with an even smaller botanical garden dedicated to William Shakespeare. The Shakespeare Park is designed as an alpine garden meets Renaissance garden, replete with bell flowers, carnations, primroses, and rhododendrons, besides of course, a rose garden. Set in the Renaissance style of geometric parterres edged by boxwood hedges, the Shakespeare Park is a peaceful nook where you can almost always find someone sitting on one its low, stone benches, engrossed in a book.
Entry: Free
Shakespeare
Garden at Johannesburg Botanical Garden, Johannesburg
Gritty and chaotic Jo’berg—as the locals call their city of Johannesburg—is probably the last place on earth you’d expect to find a Shakespeare Garden. But this 81-hectare large green lung, situated in the otherwise bleak suburb of Emmarentia harbours a beautiful little secret at its very center. Established as a rose garden in 1964, the Shakespeare Garden has over 10,000 roses in bloom almost every day, besides a fine collection of herbs like rosemary and thyme as mentioned in the Bard’s plays. Being in Africa, the garden that overlooks the Emmarentia Dam, has an abundance of local bird life, such as ibises and weavers, and one can even feed the ducks and geese at Bird Island. And during concert season expect to be enthralled by a Shakespearean performance or two.
Entry: Free
Gritty and chaotic Jo’berg—as the locals call their city of Johannesburg—is probably the last place on earth you’d expect to find a Shakespeare Garden. But this 81-hectare large green lung, situated in the otherwise bleak suburb of Emmarentia harbours a beautiful little secret at its very center. Established as a rose garden in 1964, the Shakespeare Garden has over 10,000 roses in bloom almost every day, besides a fine collection of herbs like rosemary and thyme as mentioned in the Bard’s plays. Being in Africa, the garden that overlooks the Emmarentia Dam, has an abundance of local bird life, such as ibises and weavers, and one can even feed the ducks and geese at Bird Island. And during concert season expect to be enthralled by a Shakespearean performance or two.
Entry: Free
The
Vienna Shakespeare Garden at the Kagran School Gardens, Vienna
The newest Shakespeare Garden on our list that opened a little over a decade ago in 2005, The Vienna Shakespeare Garden is one of the best homages to the Bard. One enters this arboreal paradise through the ‘Laburnum Walk’, a floral tunnel created solely out of laburnum plants and is greeted by five distinct beds of flowers. A shady bed, a bed with afternoon sun, a magnificent display bed, a herbal bed and a classic English-style flower bed where each plant features a corresponding quote from a selection of Shakespearean literature. In fact, the garden even has a sign indicating the direction and distance of Shakespeare’s birthplace, Stratford-upon-Avon!
Entry: Free
The newest Shakespeare Garden on our list that opened a little over a decade ago in 2005, The Vienna Shakespeare Garden is one of the best homages to the Bard. One enters this arboreal paradise through the ‘Laburnum Walk’, a floral tunnel created solely out of laburnum plants and is greeted by five distinct beds of flowers. A shady bed, a bed with afternoon sun, a magnificent display bed, a herbal bed and a classic English-style flower bed where each plant features a corresponding quote from a selection of Shakespearean literature. In fact, the garden even has a sign indicating the direction and distance of Shakespeare’s birthplace, Stratford-upon-Avon!
Entry: Free
The
Shakespeare Garden at New Place, Stratford-upon-Avon
The ‘holy grail’ of all things William Shakespeare and a must-visit for the Bard’s legion of worshippers, is Stratford-upon-Avon in England’s West Midlands. And his last home, New Place is Ground Zero. This stately home that was reopened in April 2016 after a lengthy refurbishment, to coincide with the quatercentenary of Shakespeare’s death is also famous for being the place that hosts the most beautiful of all Shakespeare Gardens. Here, the mansion’s three zones are connected to each other by the garden that features rows of plants such as mulberry and rose with commemorative flags representing all of Shakespeare’s plays fluttering above the plants. The Bard’s sonnets and longer plays are represented by a ribbon of white bronze darts set into the stonework of the wall that hems the garden in.
Entry: £17.50 (adult) and £11.50 (child)
The ‘holy grail’ of all things William Shakespeare and a must-visit for the Bard’s legion of worshippers, is Stratford-upon-Avon in England’s West Midlands. And his last home, New Place is Ground Zero. This stately home that was reopened in April 2016 after a lengthy refurbishment, to coincide with the quatercentenary of Shakespeare’s death is also famous for being the place that hosts the most beautiful of all Shakespeare Gardens. Here, the mansion’s three zones are connected to each other by the garden that features rows of plants such as mulberry and rose with commemorative flags representing all of Shakespeare’s plays fluttering above the plants. The Bard’s sonnets and longer plays are represented by a ribbon of white bronze darts set into the stonework of the wall that hems the garden in.
Entry: £17.50 (adult) and £11.50 (child)
America’s Shakespeare Gardens
Cottoning onto the early 20th century craze for the Shakespeare Garden, when everything English was considered ultra-trendy, a host of popular public parks and university gardens across the United States fashioned for themselves their own spots to pay homage to the Bard:
·
The Shakespeare Garden at Pittsburgh’s
Mellon Park is devoted to herbs and medicinal plants.
·
Perfumed with the fragrance of pansies and
musk-roses, the Shakespeare Garden at Manhattan’s Central Park is a
breath-taking place to visit. It is also the place where the mulberry tree is said
to have come from Shakespeare’s property at his final home, New Place in Stratford-upon-Avon.
·
Believed to be America’s first Shakespeare
Garden is the one in Evanston, Illinois.
·
The Shakespeare Garden at Gordon Park in
Cleveland was built in 1916 in honour of the tercentenary of Shakespeare’s
death.
·
Also created in 1916 is the Shakespeare
Garden at Vassar University in Poughkeepsie, New York, by a group of English
literature and botany students.
A Quartet of Shakespeare’s ‘flowery’ Verses
·
Roses:
“I have seen roses damask’d, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks…”
—Sonnet 130
“I have seen roses damask’d, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks…”
—Sonnet 130
·
Daisies
and Violets:
“When daisies pied and violets blue
And lady-smocks all silver-white
And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue
Do paint the meadows with delight.”
—Love’s Labours Lost (5.2.900-4)
“When daisies pied and violets blue
And lady-smocks all silver-white
And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue
Do paint the meadows with delight.”
—Love’s Labours Lost (5.2.900-4)
·
Lilies:
“Like the lily,
That once was mistress of the field and flourish’d,
I’ll hang my head and perish.”
—Henry VIII (3.1.168-70)
“Like the lily,
That once was mistress of the field and flourish’d,
I’ll hang my head and perish.”
—Henry VIII (3.1.168-70)
·
Poppy
and Mandrake:
“Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owedst yesterday.”
—Othello (3.3.368-71)
“Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owedst yesterday.”
—Othello (3.3.368-71)
(An edited version of this article first appeared in the January 2018 issue of Jetwings Domestic in-flight magazine of Jet Airways https://www.jetairways.com/EN/DE/JetExperience/magazines.aspx)
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