I really appreciate how Tolstaya uses the narrator (a young woman), the imagery of a vast, beautiful garden, and Pasha’s affair with Margarita to tie in notions of youthfulness among both life and death. Tolstaya starts off by using the garden as a metaphor for childhood: “In the beginning was the garden. Childhood was a garden. Without end or limit, without borders and fences…”. With this lyrical style of writing, Tolstaya is able to capture the essence of the gardens in his long, detailed descriptions, and bring in the themes of innocence and curiosity characteristic of childhood. Later in the piece, Tolstaya writes of Pasha’s journey to the garden after a day of work, “…hurries to his Garden, his Paradise, where evening peace comes from the lake…”. By capitalizing “Garden” and “Paradise” the reader is forced to acknowledge and respect the role of the garden in Pasha’s life and in this piece more broadly. She later writes of the garden as an experience that transports Pasha “into the land of lost youth, the land of hopes come true…”. This ties back the idea of the youthfulness and the simplicity that the garden brings to even adult life.

The garden – childhood – does not present Pasha with any “borders” and “fences” and has proven to have no “end” or “limit”, as he revisits it each time he returns to the garden. This piece ties in perfectly with the theme for today’s class, The 20^th-century nostalgic pastoral. The pastoral is often depicted by a peaceful and beautiful landscape that has been tamed or maintained by humankind. A garden is the perfect example of this. Additionally, there are themes of nostalgia in Tolstaya’s piece as she discusses the beauty of childhood from the perspective of the narrator and of Pasha.