This isn't so much a how-to on gardening as a how-to on thinking aboutgardening. It follows the course of the natural year, from springthrough winter, as [Pollan], an editor at Harper's , chronicles hisgrowth as a gardener in Connecticut's rocky Housatonic Valley. Startingout as a "child of Thoreau," [Pollan] soon realized that society'sconcept of culture as the enemy of nature would get him a bumper crop ofweeds and well-fed woodchucks but no vegetables to eat. Far moreserviceable materially and philosophically, he now finds, is themetaphor of a garden, where nature and culture form a harmonious whole.[Pollan] finds ample time for musing on how his own tasks fit in withthe overall scheme of existence; thus, there are chapters titled"Compost and Its Moral Imperatives" and "The Idea of a Garden." Althoughserious in import, the writing is never ponderous; [Pollan]'s wit