Books

A River Runs Through It

A family of fly fishermen lose a brother. 

This is the best fishing book. And it’s also a beautifully written piece of literature, even for those who don’t fish. 

I’ve read maybe a dozen fishing books, and with the exception of John Gierach’s books, I’ve found them all at least a little off putting as a consequence of the authors’ varying degrees of poseur. Most were filthy casuals, even those who purported to be dedicated or addicted.

Norman Maclean is the real thing. He’s a true fisherman. It matters to me, but only because of that Gell-Mann amnesia effect. 

What will matter to many more is that he’s also an outstanding writer and storyteller. He writes with humor and poetry, but always stays grounded. 

I held off reading this because I love the movie and I didn’t want a sub par book to compromise my enjoyment. Far from it, turned out. 

Recommended for everyone. Highly recommended for anyone who fishes or loves someone who fishes.

Mrs Dalloway

A day in the life of an aristocrat.

I reference it only begrudgingly, because this book only achieves the palest shadow of its target, but it wants to be Ulysses so badly. It is far from it.

The writing at the level of the sentence is very good, and paragraphs sometimes form into coherent sections. But at any point, the perspective might shift to another person, or to a flashback, or from pure stream of consciousness to a more structured narrative.

Ulysses can also feel disorienting and even apparently incoherent at times, but I think any decent reader will find that by the end, it has formed a meaningful whole. Mrs Dalloway does not.

All the nonsense and rigamarole of high modernism with none of its compensating virtues.

Maybe I just didn’t work hard enough at this book. But if there’s significant meaning embedded somewhere in this book, it’s deeply encoded. Seemed like cargo cult modernism and not the real thing.

If anyone loves it, please come help me understand.

Not recommended.