THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 25, 1996 TAG: 9608211158
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J2 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Book Review
SOURCE: BY EDITH R. WHITE
LENGTH: 89 lines
SHAKE THEM 'SIMMONS DOWN
And Other Adventures in the Lives of Trees
JANET LEMBKE
Lyons & Burford. 229 pp. $22.95.
``It's in our power as human beings to imagine ourselves as eagles, whales, horses, bears, cats, sharks, snakes and even insects . . . I doubt, however, that many of us can imagine ourselves as trees,'' says Janet Lembke in the introduction to Shake Them 'Simmons Down.
But Lembke comes as close as humanly possible to grafting her identity onto trees she has observed. ``In this arboretum of stories,'' she explains, she has looked at selected trees through the lenses of ``botany, history, medicine, folklore, cookery and longstanding personal acquaintance.''
Sometimes she branches out into mythology and poetry. No lore of trees stumps her. She tastes, cooks, makes dyes and cool drinks and even soap from berries, leaves and bark. She traces the Latin names for trees back to classic mythology and is convinced that every tree has its dryad to connect with all that is timeless and holy.
Although Lembke reveals little of her own life, it is clear from reading between the leaves that she is an erudite lady in her 60th decade. She and her husband, ``the Chief,'' divide their time between the mountains of Virginia and the banks of the River Neuse in North Carolina. She has published four previous essay collections and is an accomplished translator of Greek and Latin poetry.
Lembke claims she is not a botanist but simply one who amuses herself ``going up and down hill.'' Words delight her. The common names of trees like ``tacamahac, kingnut, possum oak . . . farkleberry, bodark, devil's walking stick'' please her. She claims they also preserve native languages ``from the Malaysian upas to the native American tupelo, catalpa and sassafras.''
Her knowledge of the historical records of early naturalists in North America is amazing. She quotes freely from Thomas Harriot who, in 1590, published A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia, and John Lawson's A New Voyage to Carolina which first appeared in 1709.
The most intriguing book she shares with her readers is by Erasmas Darwin, grandfather of Charles, who wrote on the sex life of plants. His critics thought him radical, ungodly and blasphemous. His book was placed on the Catholic index of forbidden books.
His ``novel strategy to disarm his critics'' was to write in heroic couplets. Thus his stirling facts about plant reproduction, gilded with high-flown poetry, were made acceptable. William Blake engraved plates for this ``botanical equivalent of The Joy of Sex.''
Of course Thomas Jefferson, ``a man as passionate about plants as he was about life and liberty'' is often referred to, and his letters and garden records cited.
``Shake Them 'Simmons Down,'' a line from an old-timey southern reel tune, titles an essay about the persimmon tree, from its first description by Captain John Smith in his Generall Historie of Virginia . . . to recipes for using the pulp in bread, cookies and pudding.
The pungent pawpaw tastes of ``the creamy smoothness of banana, enlivened by a light but definite hint of pineapple, a dollop of clover honey and a dash of vanilla.'' It is relished by many animals including the crawfish, and may one day prove useful in destroying cancer cells. Some of this Lembke gleaned at the world's first pawpaw conference. Where else could you find a recipe for Pawpaw Zabaglione?
``A lot of medicines grow out there in the wild,'' says Juanita, an elderly Carolina neighbor. Sassafras will clean the blood, and rabbit tobacco, boiled and strained, brings down a fever.
This leads to a discussion of tobacco and thence to all the things rural neighbors smoked as children: corn silk, clover, alfalfa, acorn pipes, oak root, fungus, monkey cigars and hollyhock stalks. ``Hogoo'' is the name Lembke gives this adolescent fascination with the sensual phenomenon of smoke.
If you enjoy a rambling collection of nature lore, Shake Them 'Simmons Down is your cup of herbal tea. Brew some with sassafras, or perhaps berryade made from sumac. Then settle to sip and muse on the Neuse with Lembke.
I suspect it will be a small tea party. Although Lembke describes vividly the flower, sap flavor and bark of each tree, the essays lack the bite to grab most readers, unless they are information packrats. Adventures in the Lives of Trees never quite gets off the ground. MEMO: Edith R. White is a Norfolk storyteller, artist and librarian.
SIGNING
Janet Lembke will sign copies of ``Shake Them 'Simmons Down'' on
Thursday at 7 p.m. at Manteo Booksellers, 105 Sir Walter Raleigh St.,
Manteo. Call (919) 473-1221. ILLUSTRATION: Drawing
[John Earle/ The Virginian-Pilot] by CNB