In my last post, a book review, I mentioned the differences in how writers describe fruit. Sure, the older descriptions are adequate. They do the trick. But in my opinion, they are flawed by their accuracy. Here’s a sample piece of Charles Downing’s (The Fruits and Fruit Trees of America) description of the White Winter Pearmain, ca. 1881:
"Basin uneven. Skin pale yellow, with slight blush or warm cheek, thickly sprinkled with minute brown dots. Flesh yellowish, tender, crisp, juice very pleasant subacid. Very good."
Okay, Okay. Downing is trying to be objective. He knows that beauty (and flavor) is in the eye of the beholder. He’s describing the characteristics of hundreds of fruit varieties in his book, and he must use uniform terminology. But I’d like to know something about the life of this apple! The personality! Give me some metaphors! Consider the following, written about the same time, by J.M. Hasness, the Secretary of the Holt County Horticultural Society, for the Report of The Missouri State Horticultural Society, 1884:
"Some varieties, like men, start off well, make a brilliant record for a few years, than so utterly fail as to disgust their warmest friends and admirers. Of such is the White Winter Pearmain, famous in Northwest Missouri fifteen years ago, and at that time really a fine, delicious variety, but now I pronounce it worthless."
Now, there’s an opinionated comment. It sounds as though Mr. Hasness has been let down a few times by the people in his life. Poor guy. He then got an axe, went out to his orchard, and took out his frustrations on his worthless White Winter Pearmains.
Of course I’m not being fair. These two writers were trying to accomplish two very different things with their words. As I said, Downing’s words are deliberately dry, in order to give an objective description. But in doing that, he doesn’t express the passion in horticulture. This time of year, I find myself every morning walking into my backyard garden simply to see what may have popped up from the soil. I’m checking the buds on my pear trees every day, to see if they’ve opened. Whether you grow fruit or flowers, there’s too much emotion in horticulture to ignore.
