The Last Garden in England

Content Warning: This section of the guide discusses child loss and abuse.

Venetia Smith is an iconoclastic and independent woman for her time: She is 35 and unmarried, a professional landscape designer working to support herself and her brother, with creative ideas that do not follow tradition. This is notable, as in 1907, women did not even have the right to vote or engage in many other social freedoms. However, Venetia is “used to [her] freedom” (38). She does not abide by others’ opinions of her and speaks her mind without reservation though she does acquiesce to her employers. This is a professional necessity: She must convince them that her ideas will reflect well on their taste and social status.

As Emma notes of Venetia, whose work she greatly admires, she “would have been considered a bit of an artist, a bit of a revolutionary” (66). That is, Venetia’s work revitalized the traditional English garden, making it more in tune with nature, less groomed and controlled; Venetia’s gardens reflect the woman herself, a bit untamed. The weather reports that she supplies at the beginning of each of her entries serve as signifiers for her state of mind—“Raw” indicates both the bitterly cold winter weather but also her emotional condition, for example—emphasizing her connection to nature, the cycles of the

Don't Miss Out!

Access Study Guide Now