Editor's note: In May 2020, Chen Danyan was appointed as the "Cultural Garden Director" of Chenshan Botanical Garden. Almost at the same time, her novel "Snow White's Resume" was also launched by Zhejiang Literature and Art Publishing House, and the third story in the novel happened to be about the moon season, about love, aging and youth.
From the winter solstice to the spring equinox this year, for 90 days, Chen Danyan will publish a small article in the "Culture Class" column of the surging news every week, as the observation log of the "Cultural Garden Director", accompanying readers to understand the relationship between plants and literature, and the relationship between plants and life.
Apricot Moon Season – "Nameless Jude"
Before going to the Moon Season Garden, I didn't know that the original European hybrid moon season, each plant has a name, their names carry the temperature and color of the cultivator's heart, and they are their descriptions of the world. Seeing it, seeing the name given to it by the breeders on the small sign, I am often touched by that name. Standing on the grass beside them, the moon season began to silently tell its story. "Nameless Jude" is an apricot-colored moon season commemorating a European realist novel. "Juliet" is a flower with intricate petals, the petals rotate slightly, spraying red colors, like a girl in love who can't help but smile.
Looking around, this sunlit moon garden has 600 kinds of moon seasons, how many stories are hidden, how many heartbreaks, how many gratitude, how many memorials. Then, I also began to tell the story of the moon season.
Dr. Hu (second from left), the director of the park, works at the Yueji Garden to determine the location and size of the sign on the ground.
My story was recorded and made into audio, and small signs accompanied the moon season. From september 2020, when the first story board was erected, to the second week of the winter solstice in 2021, the story signs almost all entered the garden. Dr. Hu, the director of the park, and my master, Zhou Danyan, compared the height of their bloom next spring next spring next year, some 65 centimeters, some 55 centimeters, and our signs should be humble. But placing them in the museum's walls brings them closer to an exhibition hall about the seasons of the month.
Dr. Hu said that the botanical garden is a museum of nature.