About this item
Could a book by any other name smell as sweet? Absolutely not. The rose is the world's favorite flower - and always has been. It is our greatest floral symbol of love and romance, and it is a bloom that touches our hearts as the flower most often chosen to celebrate significant milestones - weddings, anniversaries, births, and indeed, deaths. In this book, Catherine Horwood traces the botanical, religious, literary, and artistic journeys of the rose across the centuries, from battles to bridal bouquets. From Cleopatra's rose petal-filled bed to Nijinsky's Spectre de la Rose, from the highly prized Attar of Rose oil so beloved by the ancient Persians to the rosy scents of top perfume labels today, from Shakespearean myths about the War of the Roses to the significance of roses in Queen Elizabeth I's embroidered dresses, and even to blockade-running during the Napoleonic Wars to satisfy Empress Josephine's passion for collecting her favorite flower, Rose blossoms with the many stories of our ardor for this botanical family.
About the Author
Dr Catherine Horwood has written widely on British social and cultural history, and her latest book, Gardening Women: Their Stories from 1600 to the Present will be published in the UK by Virago in May 2010.
A passionate gardener, she has won many prizes for her gardens which have been featured in books and magazines internationally, and was for many years an assistant organiser of the National Gardens Scheme, of the famous 'Yellow Book' gardens open for charity, in the London area. She now gardens high on a roof in North London and firmly on the ground in Suffolk.
Before raising her family, Catherine was a journalist on UK magazines including Good Housekeeping. She returned to further education in her forties and is now an honorary research fellow of the Bedford Centre for the History of Women at Royal Holloway, University of London. Her PhD was 'Keeping Up Appearances. Clothes, Class and Culture, 1918-1939'. She has been a visiting fellow at the Yale Center for British Art, and, in 2007, was awarded the Ernestine Richter Avery Fellowship at the Huntington Library, Art Collection and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, CA.
In addition to her books, she regularly writes articles and book reviews for leading UK publications and newspapers, and gives talks on her favourite interests of gardening and dress codes.
Photo credit: Charlie Hopkinson
