Hortobiography by Carol Klein: The day I hit the BBC's 'grass-ceiling'

Hortobiography by Carol Klein: The day I hit the BBC's 'grass-ceiling' Constance Craig Smith reviews horticulturist and TV presenter Carol Klein's new memoir By Constance Craig Smith Published: 06:01 BST, 4 October 2024 | Updated: 06:01 BST, 4 October 2024 e-mail View comments Hortobiography by Carol Klein (Ebury £22, 322pp) Hortobiography is available now from the Mail Bookshop When Monty Don stepped back from presenting Gardeners’ World in 2008 because of ill health, many viewers assumed Carol Klein would take over as lead presenter. Hugely knowledgeable, an award-winning plantswoman and a TV natural, there was surely no better fit for the nation’s favourite gardening programme. The BBC , shamefully, drew up an all-male shortlist for the job.

Responding to the outcry at being overlooked, Klein commented wittily that she had clearly hit the corporation’s ‘grass ceiling’. This warm, gently meandering autobiography – interspersed with plenty of horticultural wisdom – shows that she has survived quite a few setbacks in her life. Growing up in and around Manchester, Klein had a tough childhood.

Her father, a civil servant, spent a year in prison for fraud and, as a result, Klein lost her scholarship to the school she was attending. She adored her mother, but her father could be violent. Once, when they were out on a walk and he thought she was talking too much, he ‘dealt me an adult-sized smack on my head, knocking me into the ditch’.

From an early age, Klein .