David Falkayn is in the third-story guest apartment of an Ikranankan Imperial palace. From the balcony, he sees the palace gardens which suggest Old Japanese:
rocks;
low plants;
subtle colors;
a fountain in a glass column to control evaporation.
On his next mission, Falkayn will see another garden reminiscent of Japanese. See In And Around Castle Afon.
4 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And I think gardens in Stirling's IN THE COURTS OF THE CRIMSON KINGS are also arranged as in Japan. Plus the gardens in Stirling's Mars have fountains protected by glass columns. It was considered a sign of being EXTREMELY wealthy for one Martian aristocrat not to bother covering his fountain like that (albeit, I think he did have a glass ROOFED garden.
Sean
And of course, the Japanese have a number of different gardening traditions, ultimately derived from Chinese models -- the extremely austere one that's most famous is a development of temple gardens under Zen influence, and the aesthetic ideal of simplicity for its own sake that developed (Yugen and Geido, roughly) during the Japanese medieval period affected garden design too.
Some of the differences are analogous to the differences between "classical" (geometric) and "English" gardening styles in the West.
Dear Mr. Stirling,
I think classical, geometric gardening derived from designs worked out in the reigns of Louis XIV and Louis XV of France.
Sean
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