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Orchid : a cultural history / Jim Endersby.

by Endersby, Jim.

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The University of Chicago Press ; Royal Botanic Gardens, 2016.

Orchids -- History.

Orchids in literature.

9780226376325 (hc.)

viii, 292 p. : col. ill.; 23 cm.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 271-283) and index.

Introduction: imagining orchids -- Censored origins -- The lesbian boy -- The uses of orchids -- Red book, black flower -- Utopian botany -- The signature of all things -- The name of the orchid -- Making a family -- A second Adam -- Artificial to natural -- Myths of orchids -- Orchidmania -- The blooming aristocracy -- Orchis bank -- Every trifling detail -- Beautiful contrivances -- The scramble for orchids -- Lost orchids -- Cannibal tales -- Savage orchids -- Long purples and a forked radish -- Queer flowers -- Creation and consolation -- Sexy orchids -- Boy's own orchids -- Manly orchids -- Frail orchids -- Deceptive orchids -- Orchids in orbit -- Endangered orchids -- Fragile specialists -- The spider orchids of Sussex -- Conclusion: an orchid's-eye view?

Some flowers make us think of love or heaven, of political causes or drug cravings, while others are food, medicine, or decoration; almost every plant that humans have ever taken an interest in has acquired a rich web of associations. So it is not surprising that flowers as alluring as orchids are associated with a very specific set of images, ideas, and symbols. Yet the precise significances we attach to orchids may be, Jim Endersby argues, the weirdest ever to have become linked to a plant. By following orchids through history, Endersby discovers unexpected connections that lead us into myriad other histories.

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