Stars: 1
Review by: MandyApgar
Chief gardener of the palace since 1982, one would hope Baraton would be a bit more insightful about his subject. Working his way up from the ranks (originally being trained by a semi-rebellious master who seemed glued to his beret) he has seen a lot of the various departments and institutions involved in making the garden a functional, self sustaining part of Versailles. A complement to the palace instead of just part, and when he goes into his day to day routine things are pretty good. Problem being, he doesn't do that very much. The book begins with his recollections of a massive storm that toppled many ancient and beloved trees, but his memories seem to be more about himself than the task at hand. Just would not stop going on about certain things in his life. Yes, this is a memoir. But when it is on the gardener of freaking Versailles we would hope to find more about the actual garden (no color photos, save the jacket) and less of his improvised history. (The Wall Street Journal remarked on that too, I googled his name and their review came up.) He takes a very lyrical attitude towards interpreting certain events, with some persons being given thoughts he is oh so sure they had, and in other cases is dismissive about things that are not relevant to him. Like he waxed on fluidly attributing a near mystic aura to his own ghost sighting, but another one reported by two ladies was ridiculed. Not very appealing on any front and rather pretentious at times.
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