The Habit of Rivers: Reflections on Trout Streams and Fly Fishing - Hardcover

Leeson, Ted

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1558213007 ISBN 13: 9781558213005

Publisher: Lyons & Burford, 1994

Synopsis

Offers meditations on fishing in the Northwest, looking at streamside natural history, flies and those who tie them, and some unpleasant chance encounters with other fishermen

About this title

About the Author

Ted Leeson teaches English at Oregon State University.

From the Back Cover

There was a time that I didn't fish, writes Ted Leeson in his introduction to this stunning first book, 'but I cannot remember it. Thirty-five years ago I toddled off to Turtle Creek with a cane pole and worms and returned with a six-inch smallmouth and a monkey on my back. I ate the bass and have been feeding the monkey ever since.' With wry humor and rare insight, The Habit of Rivers tells the story of Leeson's passion for rivers, trout, and fly fishing, and his experiences as a newcomer to the Pacific Northwest - 'the land of unceasing seasons' - he looks beneath the surface of fly fishing to explore questions that engage most fishermen: 'What is the strange gravity of a trout stream? What is it about rivers that draws us so irresistibly, and why does fly fishing seem such an aptly suited response?' Above all, The Habit of Rivers is a book about ways of seeing the wonderfully textured world that emanates from a river. 'Despite its reliance on the line,' Leeson writes, 'fly fishing is not linear. It is radial and weblike. At the center is a rising trout, and millimeters above his nose is the fly. From it, paths trace outward . . . just as far as you wish to go.' In pursuing these paths, Leeson finds everything from salmon, steelhead, and trout, to driftboats, art, insects, gravity, death, philosophy, books, fly tying, and microbreweries - and links them together with an intelligence that is provocative, witty, and illuminating. What emerges is a brilliantly original book about a certain vision of fishing, and fishing as a certain habit of vision, about seasons as spaces and landscapes as times, about rivers that express interior geographies as much as exterior ones. The Habit of Rivers begins with a deep respect for trout and trout streams, and ends in wisdom earned by hard and faithful attention to the natural world. (6 1/4 X 9 1/4, 196 pages)

Reviews

Of all sports, fishing has the richest literature and, in number of titles, seemingly the most of any hobby save chess. This volume outshines all recent entries. As an English professor at Oregon State University, Leeson is amply qualified to write a literate angling book, but his lambent, fluid prose, graced with wit and warmth, far transcends such concepts as qualification. "The craft of angling is the catching of fish. But the art of angling is a responsiveness . . . letting one thing lead to another until . . . you realize some small completeness." These essays are small, elegant completions opening windows to the rivers of the Pacific Northwest (mostly eastern Oregon's Columbia River Basin). In a flyfisher's dialect, Leeson tells an angler's story with the full-throated voice of a naturalist. Those who wonder what it is they're really after out there in the stream will find the answer here. Leeson's work belongs on the shelf next to that of Annie Dillard, John McPhee, Barry Lopez and others of their stripe (and speckle).
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Casting his line in the wilds of the Blue Mountains of Oregon, fly fisherman Leeson (contributing editor, Fly Rod & Reel; English/Oregon State Univ.) is in his element; but as the Spinoza of the Umpqua he crashes and burns. Leeson spends much of his time fly-fishing the waters of the Northwest for trout, steelhead, and salmon, and he has clearly given his avocation long, deep thought. He often, however--too often--seems to be thinking out loud on the page, his ideas not yet distilled. He can be aggravatingly coy (going fishing is ``nonterminal, participial indefiniteness''), reach too hard (``the salmon run is a confluence of origins and eventualities''), let the fishing get bogged down in overanalysis, and display a dismaying lack of humor. When he finally gets midstream and starts fishing, though, things throttle back and lighten up. This looser, more spontaneous style shows Leeson at his best--observant, inventive, human. Particularly good are his quick sketches of streamside natural history (birds and trout do seem strangely entwined) and the more extended meditations on flies and those who tie them. And readers will crack smiles reading of his unpleasant chance encounters (he wading, they floating) with other fishermen. But then he'll go and kill the pleasure of the moment again with a ham- fisted, pompous discourse on catch-and-release fishing, or muse interminably about the ``geometry'' of this, the ``fixity'' of that--and any rhythm that has been developed slows down and dies. Leeson's prose needs to be brought down to fighting weight, like the type of fly he most admires. Minimally dressed, it could be quite catching. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Here's a fly fisher who, for once, has not forgotten his roots. Most anglers of his type tend to dwell on midge hatches, the glories of the days and nights spent in search of fish, and the glittering sun on the shimmering, crystal-clear waters. Leeson, contrariwise, admits with a certain glee that his early fishing consisted of a cane pole, a can of worms, and fish no self-respecting adult angler would admit to catching. This is a book by a fly fisher, though, one whose goal is to catch trout and whose method is to use flies. The matter of fly-fishing, trout, and flowing waters constitutes ground so well trod that it's nearly a morass of clich{‚}es, but Leeson manages to make his foray into the watery field an entertaining read. Anyone with the itch to angle can relate to the chapter in which Leeson drives for days in search of new waters and new fish, a chapter that alone makes the book worthwhile reading, no matter what your gear or quarry. Jon Kartman

"The fishing here is invariably superb; always, it's the catching that's up for grabs." Such is the refreshing, sometimes humorous, always gracefully expressed philosophy of Leeson. He believes that fly fishing can take one outside oneself and help one develop new ways of seeing. Leeson fishes as much as 100 days a year; writes for Field & Stream , Fly Rod & Reel , and other magazines; teaches English; ties flies; and knows the literature of the field. Yet this is not a how-to, or what-with, but rather a passionate celebration of the attractions of rivers, trout, and fishing. As in Howell Raines's Fly Fishing Through the Midlife Crisis ( LJ 9/15/93), the arts of angling, writing, and living are blended. Public and academic libraries should acquire this fine book.
- Roland Person, Southern Illinois Univ. Lib., Carbondale
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Lyons & Burford
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1558213007
• ISBN 13: 9781558213005
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 190