My entry into serious gardening began when we moved to a mostly shady but big garden in Kerrisdale in Vancouver in 1986. Most botanical publications mentioned a plant called hosta. By the time we left that garden in 2015 to our present location in Kitsilano I had amassed some 600 plus of the plant. My discerning eye (because I like hostas) could and can note the difference between one variegated wonder and another. 

But if you look closely during the growing season of this shade tolerant (never loving) plant you might notice as I did many years ago that the unopened flowers on the tips of the scapes (hosta lingo for stalk) are quite elegant. When they open some of these flowers can be awfully fragrant as is the pure white flower of Hosta plantaginea sometimes called the August lily.