ABSTRACT
Ever since I have been in Persia I have been looking for a garden and have not found one.” 1 Vita Sackville-West was sitting in a Persian garden while she was writing these words; it was her way of introducing the difference in conception between an English garden and a Persian one. “Garden? We say; and think of lawns and herbaceous borders, which is manifestly absurd. There is no turf in this parched country; and as for herbaceous borders, they postulate a lush shapeliness unimaginable to the Persian mind.” She then explains that after a ride in summer for days across plains and mountains, “when you come to trees and running water you call it a garden. It will not be flowers and their garishness that your eyes crave for, but a green cavern full of shadow, and pools where goldfish dart, and the sound of little streams. That is the meaning of a garden in Persia”.
