Hemmeleg, botanisk hage 🗝🌷

Ein løynd hage, for meg eit kjært og varmt barndomsminne. Hugsar mormor fortalde meg om den Den hemmelighetsfulle hagen (fyrste gong gitt ut på norsk i 1918 som Den hemmelighetsfulde have, no Den hemmelige hagen), eg har lese den på norsk tidlegare, sett fleire av filmatiseringane og nyleg lese den på engelsk i ei nydeleg utgåve frå Puffin Clothbound Classics. Og neida, den botaniske hagen å Ullandhaug er ikkje hemmeleg, men eg berre måtte skrive det som eit slags ordspel på bokas tittel. "Mistress Mary always felt that however many years she lived she should never forget that first morning when her garden began to grow. Of course, it did seem to begin to grow for her that morning." (s. 122)

 

Som i Anne of Green Gables, er det så mange flotte skildringar av naturen, og fleire av dei skreiv eg ned. Joda, innimellom er språket utdatert og Mary framstår som over gjennomsnittet sutrete, men magien med nøkkelen til den hemnelege hagen, alt som gror og mysteriet med skrika i natten, den er der enno. I Miranda sin bokklubb Comfort Book Club er The Secret Garden nemleg marsboka, og det var kjekt å lese den igjen etter såpass mange år – og tenk: då eg var ute og tok bilete av boka i den botaniske hagen, møtte eg ein raudstrupe, akkurat som Mary i boka! "She stopped with a little laugh of pleasure, and there, lo and behold, was the robin swaying on a long branch of ivy. He had followed her and he greeted her with a chirp." (s. 84). Eg skal innrømme at det kom ei tåre og to, for eg blei nokså rørt der me stod i solskinet.

 

Å, den raudstrupen var berre så fin. "The robin flew from his swinging spray of ivy on to the top of the wall and he opened his beak and sang a loud, lovely trill, merely to show off. Nothing in the world is quite as adorably lovely as a robin when he shows off—and they are nearly always doing it." (s. 84). Plutseleg var den ferdig med å posere og flaug av garde.

 

"They always called it Magic and indeed it seemed like it in the months that followed—the wonderful months – the radiant months – the amazing ones. Oh! the things which happened in that garden! If you have never had a garden, you cannot understand, and if you have had a garden you will know that it would take a whole book to describe all that came to pass there. At first it seemed that green things would never cease pushing their way through the earth, in the grass, in the beds, even in the crevices of the walls. Then the green things began to show buds and the buds began to unfurl and show color, every shade of blue, every shade of purple, every tint and hue of crimson. In its happy days flowers had been tucked away into every inch and hole and corner." (s. 268)

 

"Satiny poppies of all tints danced in the breeze by the score, gaily defying flowers which had lived in the garden for years and which it might be confessed seemed rather to wonder how such new people had got there. And the roses – the roses! Rising out of the grass, tangled round the sun-dial, wreathing the tree trunks and hanging from their branches, climbing up the walls and spreading over them with long garlands falling in cascades – they came alive day by day, hour by hour. Fair fresh leaves, and buds – and buds – tiny at first but swelling and working Magic until they burst and uncurled into cups of scent delicately spilling themselves over their brims and filling the garden air." (s. 268). Ei varm og god leseoppleving som tok meg med tilbake til barndommen.