@mobotgarden's Museum, Now on view: THE LITERARY GARDEN The Cultivation of Plants & Gardens in Narratives Through March 31, 2027 https://teapaw.org/t.co/7pzoRBSRCl
St Louis, MO, USA
Joined September 2018
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Opening Friday May 8 @mobotmuseum!🌿📚The Literary Garden: The Cultivation of Plants & Gardens in Narratives (till March 31, 2027) explores how cultures represent plants through literary media by highlighting @mobotgarden collections.
missouribotanicalgarden.org/…
#TheLiteraryGarden VEGETABLE LITERACY (2013) by Deborah Madison invites readers to explore vegetables via their botanical families. She advocates for observation, experimentation, and respect for plants as living ingredients, connecting kitchens with gardens and food systems.
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#TheLiteraryGarden De Re Coquinaria is the oldest surviving cookbook from the ancient Roman period (1st c. CE). Recipes include herbs, vegetables, and spices, such as lovage, used to make the dishes more flavorful. Lovage (Levisticum officinale) @mobotgarden Herbarium
#TheLiteraryGarden Kitab al-Tabikh (The Book of Dishes) is one of the 1st cookbooks providing culinary practices of the Islamic Arabian Peninsula. Written by Ibn Sayyar al-Warraq (10th c.), it highlights herbs such as galangal. Galangal (Alpinia galanga) @mobotgarden Herbarium
#TheLiteraryGarden The Joy of Cooking is considered one of the most influential American cookbooks. Irma Rombauer, a St. Louis native who lived in the Shaw neighborhood adjacent to @mobotgarden, designed the book to be very simple and easy to understand. Pix: @virginia_harold
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#TheLiteraryGarden Cecilia M. Gibbs is one of Australia's children's authors and illustrators. Her villains, the big bad banksia men, have scared generations of Australian children but they are only the ripe cobs of bushes in the genus Banksia. Peter H. Raven Library @mobotgarden
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#TheLiteraryGarden There are about 180 Banksia species found only in Australia, belonging to the macadamia family (Proteaceae). Each cob supports hundreds of tiny nectar secreting florets but few florets are pollinated and only a few hard fruits develop.
@mobotgarden Herbarium
#NativeAmericanHeritageMonth Observance
November 6-8, 2026; 9 – 5 p.m.
Jack C. Taylor Visitor Center @mobotgarden
missouribotanicalgarden.org/…
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#BooksThatBloom #TheLiteraryGarden Harlem Renaissance writer Effie Lee Newsome was renowned as a writer of children’s poems and illustrator for magazines and newspapers, though her only book of poetry was Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers.
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#TheLiteraryGarden The Black-eyed Susan personifies the young girl depicted in the poem “To a Little Gold Daisy.” These flowers are attractive to a wide variety of pollinators, including butterflies, and play host to the larvae of several butterfly species. @mobotgarden Herbarium
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#BooksThatBloom #TheLiteraryGarden Barbie is an iconic American toy, whose world building includes many options for professions and creative play through the fashions and toy sets designed for the character. These objects highlight the doll’s foray into gardening 🌿📚💚👒👩🌾
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#TheLiteraryGarden Published by the MBG Press! Pizotito & the Wonders of the Dry Forest is co-written by Laura Toro González, an ecologist @mobotgarden. Rosie & Pogo Visit the Missouri Botanical Garden is by Liz Byrde, a therapeutic horticulture coordinator at the Garden.
#TheLiteraryGarden Sal tree (Shorea robusta), Nepal
@mobotgarden. The Sal tree grows across South China, Myanmar, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and India, forming Sal forests. Sal trees & forests are culturally, economically, and religiously crucial for the Eastern Himalayas region.
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Books that Bloom #TheLiteraryGarden Children’s books are crafted and written with an awareness of the world, and this didactic writing has always included the botanical world.
Paradisi in Sole Paradisus Terrestris by John Parkinson (1567–1650) Raven Library @mobotgarden
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#TheLiteraryGarden English herbalist/botanist John Parkinson’s Paradisi in Sole Paradisus Terrestris (a play on words in Latin as Park-in-Sun’s Terrestrial Paradise) is a landmark text in horticultural literature as a guide for gardeners of all ages, highlighting Myrtle species.
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#TheLiteraryGarden For #NationalBookMonth, @mobotmuseum shouts out the work of @mobotgarden's Peter H. Raven Library and Archives and the MBG Press for all the important work they do in preserving and educating the public on plants!
(including these books!📸: @virginia_harold)
The Elizabeth von Arnim Society invites proposals for "Literary Gardens: Cultivation, Movement, and Modernism," an international online conference to be held February 12–13, 2027, in conversation with #TheLiteraryGarden @MobotMuseum
elizabethvonarnimsociety.org…
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#TheLiteraryGarden #ElPlanetaLila Brazilian author Ziraldo Alves Pinto (1932–2024)—more commonly called Ziraldo—started his career as a cartoonist and writer, whose children’s books have been enormously successful.
#NationalLatinxHeritageMonth #NationalHispanicHeritageMonth
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#TheLiteraryGarden This book follows a tiny bug who lived on what he believed to be a purple planet, in which everything seemed the same. He builds a spaceship and after traveling around a star called “a,” he discovered that his home planet was a violet kept inside a book.
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#TheLiteraryGarden #MagicalRealism is often considered to be the literary language of the post-colonial world. In 1982, Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez won the Nobel Prize in Literature for ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE, which follows 7 generations of the Buendía family.
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Plants play several roles throughout the novel, including the palms and ferns of the tropical landscape, the presence of a banana plantation, and the chestnut tree that plays a pivotal role in being tied to the novel’s protagonist. Guiana chestnut @mobotgarden Herbarium
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📢Final performance of THE LITERARY GARDEN series!🌿📚💚🎸
Frets and Flora: Botanical Themes in Guitar Literature
Saturday, October 17, 2026; 11am and 1pm (30-45 mins) @mobotmuseum @mobotgarden
Free with Garden admission missouribotanicalgarden.org/…
Thanks to @ksdknews for talking to Rubia this weekend! ksdk.com/video/news/local/va…
#scents #vampires #TheLiteraryGarden Meet the Vampire Perfumer, Rubia Homa is a Literary Learning Day event @mobotmuseum on Saturday, September 26, 11:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m. Free with @mobotgarden admission.
missouribotanicalgarden.org/…
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#Pollinators #TheLiteraryGarden While bats have a hold on our literary imagination as hematophages, only 3 species of S. American bat are vampires. Nectar-feeding bats hover, extending tongues to reach nectar hidden in flowers. Anoura fistulata's tongue is 1.5x its body length
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A group of particular interest is the bellflower genus Burmeistera (Campanulaceae), which includes about 150 bat-pollinated species in the cloud forests of Central and South America, many of which were discovered and named in collaboration with scientists @mobotgarden
#Dracula #TheLiteraryGarden #Vampires Irish author Bram Stoker (1847–1912) created in Dracula one of the most enduring personifications of a vampire character in his popular novel. Apotropaic plants ward off vampires; the cover of this text features a repeating garlic pattern.
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Rowan (Sorbus aucuparia) is thought to have protective properties against enchantment and supernatural creatures. Driven through the heart, rowan stakes destroy a vampire’s source of life and pin them to their graves to keep them from rising.
@mobotgarden Herbarium
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We’re at it again! The Missouri Botanical Garden hosts STL City Silent Book Club this October for another day of resting, touring, and reading. 🌻📖🪷📚🪻
📍@mobotgarden @mobotmuseum
🗓️ Mon, October 12th, 1–4pm
🎟️ Free with Garden admission
eventbrite.com/e/silent-book…
#TheLiteraryGarden So thrilled for this continued collaboration with the STL City Silent Book Club @mobotmuseum @mobotgarden 🌻📖🪷📚🪻
stlmag.com/culture/st-louis-…
#NationalHobbitDay #TheLiteraryGarden The world of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-Earth is pervaded with a distinct sense of reverence for the natural world. In the 2nd book of #LOTR trilogy, Tolkien introduces Fangorn Forest, home to the Ents, tree-like shepherds of the forest.
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A specific Black pine was considered to be Tolkien’s favorite tree at Oxford Botanic Garden, UK (lost in 2014). Its rough gray bark and twisting branches inspired the creation of the Treebeard and the Ents in THE TWO TOWERS, The Lord of The Rings.
Pix: @mobotgarden Herbarium
