Gardens of History and Imagination

Whether on the ground or in the mind, gardens carry meaning. They reflect social and aesthetic values and may express hope, anticipation, or grief. Throughout history, they have provided a means of physical survival. In creating and maintaining gardens, people construe and construct a relationship with their environment. However, there is no single meaning carried in the word 'garden': as idea and practice, it reflects cultural differences in beliefs, values, and social organisation. It embodies personal, community, and even national ways of seeing and being in the world.

There are ten essays in Gardens of History and Imagination, each of which examines the role of gardens and gardening in the settlement of New South Wales and in growing a colony and a state. They explore the significance of gardens for the health of the colony, for its economy, for the construction of social order, and for personal identity.

For the immigrants, gardening was an act of settlement and also a statement of possession. For a long time, it was with memories of 'home', often selective and idealised, that settlers made gardens. But as the colony developed its own character, so did gardening possibilities and practices.