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Maurice Mizzi: The Pleasures of Gardening in the Maltese Islands. Spiro Mizzi Foundation, 2015. 204 pp.
At long last, Maurice Mizzi has kept his promise to publish a book on gardening.
Readers will remember well his monthly gardening articles, ‘A Greener Shade of Green’, which he wrote for some 20 years. I had been pestering Maurice to publish a book on this subject, since he is a gold mine of information.
Moreover, he feels a strong passion for the garden and nature. His garden at Ras Riħana has featured in several international gardening magazines and is a pleasure to walk through, admire, enjoy and relax in.
I was curious to see the end result of this long wait and, believe me, it was worth every second. This book is a friendly guide which can be read and enjoyed by all, while retaining a very professional approach to the subject.
And, on top of that, the large number of stunning photographs (mainly taken by Maurice himself) of plants in the author’s garden make this 200-page book a very attractive publication.
I must add that all proceeds of this book will go to the Spiro Mizzi Foundation, which helps young children in the three cities, definitely a noble cause.
When I titled this short review ‘A diary of gardening love’, I meant every word of it. This book is a diary and the writer leads us through the year gently and slowly, month after month, recommending what to sow in each month. He speaks from first-hand experience since he has experimented for years on growing plants imported from far away countries, but mostly from Zone 10.
What is Zone 10? Read the book and learn. I certainly do not have green fingers but I do love reading a good book on gardening, especially if it is user-friendly. This book is certainly one of them.
The writer treats each month separately and offers his advice on a good number of things to be done or avoided during that month.
The writer leads us through the year gently and slowly, month after month, recommending what to sow in each month
Let me take just one month at random, that of April. These are the topics treated for this month: annuals, saving seeds, pests, bulbs, roses, shrubs, trees, choosing a plant, plants in containers, lawn, the green house, taking plants out of the greenhouse, ponds, the water lily, the lotus. Quite a list!
What I love is the warm, informal approach Maurice manages to establish throughout this book. He is not pompous, does not use a teaching style but establishes a chatting tone.
He gives reasons and often offers very interesting behind-the-scene stories based on his experiments, or how he managed to find the right spot for some plant which he imported from some faraway place, such as California (also in Zone 10, by the way).
This attractive hardback volume does resemble a coffee-table publication but still it is not heavy and certainly easy to handle. That’s one up for me because I read everywhere, including the most unusual places and hence opt always for a manageable size which does not over exert my fast decaying muscles.
In books of this nature it is very important to provide easy search for contents. Maurice has managed to do this superbly.
He provides an excellent index at the end of the book but also adds two other helpers. One is a list of annuals, perennials, bulbs and corms, shrubs, trees and climbers, including under each heading short information of each entry, the site required and propagation timings.
Then, he also offers an excellent four-page list in easy format with popular name, botanical name, height, colour and when to sow. So, just to choose one at random, the foxglove (popular name) would be digitalis (botanical name), 48-60 inches high, of various colour and to sow in February to March and September to October. This is what I call a ready reckoner.
This book is indeed an excellent conglomeration of tons of interesting information but the best thing about it is that all this has been imparted gracefully, in style and gusto, and in such a friendly manner that one cannot but succumb to and treasure.
The writer takes pride in say-ing that: “The purpose of this book is to pass to its readers the knowledge on horticulture which I have garnered during 60 years of gardening.”
It is indeed a labour of a long love story.