David George Haskell on 'How Flowers Made Our World'

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KQED

News, Politics, News Commentary

4.2 • 726 Ratings

🗓️ 26 March 2026

⏱️ 53 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

“When we give a scented flower, bring blooms to a grave, or dab perfume onto our skin, we are not enacting arbitrary, merely symbolic rituals. Rather, we invoke the relationships with flowering plants from which the ecology of the planet is made, and which created and sustain human life.” So writes acclaimed biologist David George Haskell, whose new book “How Flowers Made Our World” paints flowers as revolutionaries that have determined the evolution of all life on earth — and who need our help to weather climate change. He joins us and we hear from you: What role do flowers play in your life? Guests: David George Haskell, acclaimed biologist; author, "How Flowers Made Our World: The Story of Nature's Revolutionaries," "Sounds Wild and Broken" and "The Songs of Trees" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:53.0	Flowers appear at nearly every significant human life transition
0:57.0	and gathering place, says biologist David George Haskell. Flowers on a grave, a shower of
1:03.0	petals for newlyweds, floral garlands, and altar pieces, and places of worship. We may at times
1:08.9	dismiss flowers as superficially pretty or box them into narrow
1:12.3	symbolic roles, Haskell writes, but their presence at the center of acts of love, grief, community,
1:19.1	worship, and cultivation reveal that deep down we understand the central life-giving importance of flowers.
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