The Fly Fisher’s Guide to Crimes of Passion More Sedition from the Master of Meander (reviewed)

The Fly Fisher’s Guide to Crimes of Passion More Sedition from the Master of Meander
by Seth Norman
The Lyons Press, 2000
Hardcover, 240 pages, $24.95
ISBN 1-58574-135-3

The cataloging notes classify this book as "Fly Fishing-Anecdotes." They are but they are also more than mere anecdotes. Each essay touches the ethics of what is clearly a blood sport. Writers on fly fishing have a fundamental choice among three genres. There are how-to stories by the short ton. Then there are novelists who spin a fly fishing entertainment, short or long. Not so many writers here but some really big names and reputations, Ernest Hemingway, Patrick O’Brian, Rafael Sabitini, Norman McLean, Robert Traver and Rodrick Haig-Brown come to mind. There are, of course, some Me and Joe/how-to stories suspect for being novels. But Hoover and Cleveland, the fishing Presidents, both caution us that fishing truths are to be evaluated by a different standard of mendacity and I believe them. Finally there are those who write about real fishing. Seth Green does the latter as well as any of them.
"Anticipation is such a pleasurable part of fly fishing that it sometimes seems a shame to go out someplace, cast, and try to catch something." Sometimes you can’t go out for reasons varied and often personal. When you can’t, try reading this book. It produces development in your view of trout on a stream. Some examples.
On the released rainbow; "But do they ever write? Just a casual note: ‘doing fine, thanks, eating mostly caddis,’ or, ‘ Despite you, Sadist, I spawned.’"
On fly tying; "Tying is another area where expertise comes at an investment of time. With assistance, the fundamentals of palmering hackle can be learned quickly; without, the process can leave you hating chickens."
On balance in the evaluation of this seasons miracle fly; "Nor do I pretend that tinkering types often invent a better Breadcrust. It’s not often that a mutating cell advance[s] the species, I know; and unreasonable innovation leads to absurd travesties, as is evidenced every year by the women’s fashion industry."
This could go on with twenty-five stories to quote from but a better strategy is to read it yourself on a day when you cannot go fishing. Highly recommended. RWOL

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