The Sakura Obsession

In Japan, “the sakura, or cherry-blossom, culture of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries revolved around the flower’s short life and swift, predictable death. The cherry blossom was ephemeral, like life itself.”

Naoko Abe wrote about this tradition in her native Japanese in a book published in 2016. It was very well received and there was immediate interest in an English translation. She decided instead to do further research, especially on the British roots of her story. In 2019 she published the largely newly-written Sakura Obsession, the source of the quotation above, in English. For this more global audience, she included the history of many societal practices likely unknown outside of Japan.

She also describes the wild species and the many cultivars and selections of Prunus made over the centuries in Japan. By the late 1800s, these had largely been pushed aside from gardens by Prunus x yedoensis ‘Somei-yoshino’ that as a clone, provided the uniformity desired for Japanese ceremonies. This is the cherry tree of the University of Washington Quad and the dominant variety planted at the Washington, D.C. Tidal Basin.

In a parallel storyline, Abe writes the biography of Collingwood ‘Cherry’ Ingram (1880-1981), who rescued many out-of-favor cherry selections by bringing them from Japan to his English garden, later reintroducing them to their home country. It is also the study of the close relationship between two island nations and colonizing powers, Japan and Britain, and how horticulture was a common language.

There is a somber side to this history. As is possible in any culture, the symbolism of the flowers changed, especially for Japanese children, including Abe’s father, in the 1930s. “Rather than focusing on cherry blossom as a symbol of life, the songs, plays and school textbooks now focused more on death.” During World War II, branches of cherry blossoms were used to wave farewell to kamikaze pilots as they took off in their planes, going to their deaths.

On the whole, however, this is a book of hope and international goodwill. I didn’t expect to get hooked by this story but I did, and recommend it for the engaging narrative of intellectual exchange and horticultural history.

Published in the Leaflet for Scholars, February 2021, Volume 8, Issue 2.