Books by S. Natesh | Turning a new leaf

S. Natesh and illustrator Sagar Bhowmickccelebrate the individuality of India's most iconic trees

ISSUE DATE: Nov 25, 2024

Since the turn of the cent­ury, we have lost hundr­eds of thousands of trees. Many had stood for centuries, weathering storms, wars, droughts and famines. They paid the price for standing in the way of eight-lane highways, metro rail lines and SEZs. In atonement, we have supplanted their memory with nameless clo­nes in landscaped hedgerows.

A tree sprouts from a minuscule seed that lies dormant in the soil until the conditions are right for it to seek the sky. It lays claim to a parcel of earth and weathers the vagaries of time, in the process testing destiny and often writing it.

How can we not marvel at this magnificent living thing?

I think that I shall never see/ A poem lovely as a tree, gushed poet Joyce Kilmer. So does S. Natesh, a scientist who once taught botany at the University of Delhi. He sees India’s iconic trees as one may see people—with names, addresses and idiosyncrasies.

Trees become synonymous with places. With some licence, the title of Anees Jung’s memoir When a Place Becomes a Person can be applied to describing the 75 protagonists of this book. Natesh has made pilgrimages to absorb the essence of each individual tree.

Among these lumi­­naries are aliens and aborigines, natives and exotics. Included here is a saintly peepal, which mocks the pettiness of the Radcliffe Line that cleaves India and Pakistan by stretching boughs into both countries. In Andhra’s Gootibylu village is a sprawling banyan that straddles four acres. There is a Ber under which Guru Nanak gave counsel to a king. There are African baobabs of mysterious origin that survived bloody battles. And there is the loneliest tree in India—a Giant Sequoia native to California, which was planted in the yard of an institute in Jammu.

Many Indians beli­eve that our trees, like our scriptures, are older than time. However, Natesh uses scientific criteria—the study of growth rings and radiocarbon dating—to determine a tree’s age.

A new addition to the dendrophile’s bookshelf, Iconic Trees of India is no mere field guide. It is an anthology of tenderly told biographies balancing scientific temper, natural history and wonder. Opulently illustrated by Sagar Bhowmick, this book is an endearing almanac feting India’s most prominent senior citizens.