Food and garden writer Lia Leendertz is about to release her Almanac for 2019. An Amazon bestseller, it claims to “revive the tradition of the rural almanac”. Well, maybe. It certainly meets the ancient need for annual, practical information about the seasonal and planetary changes of the coming year but it does so with a modern interest in lunar gardening. Gone is the ancient almanac’s assumption that man’s daily work is underpinned by God’s divine plan.
Almanacs were the most frequently printed texts during the three centuries after the printing press came into being. They were small, cheap volumes containing crucial information for the year to come. Their short life span ensured their low survival rate: at the end of the year most almanacs were recycled as toilet paper, seals on pickling jars, wallpaper, garden mulch.
