Illuminated by Water
Fly Fishing and the Allure of the Natural World
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
In its blending of nature writing and memoir—also touching on the connection of time, beauty, and memory—Illuminated by Water is an elegiac tribute to fly fishing and the natural world.
Illuminated by Water is a book about the author’s own decades-long passion for fly fishing and how it has shaped the way he sees and thinks about the natural world. That passion is shared and made legible here, not just for other anglers, but for those who have never yet cast a line in the water. Why is it that catching fish—or even thinking about catching fish—can be so thrilling, so captivating? Why is it that time spent beside water can be imprinted so sharply in the memory? Why is it that what seems a simple act of casting a line and hoping can feel so rich in mystery?
Alternating between regional and thematic chapters, Tallack considers ‘wildness’, its pursuit, and its meanings; the compulsive appeal of tying flies; the ethics of catching and killing; the allure of big fish; and beauty—where it’s sought and where it’s found. He describes fly fishing trips to America, Canada, Shetland, and England. Throughout the book, certain themes recur—environmental harm and healing; the relationship between fishing and time; hope and its manifestations; and the ways in which angling can deepen engagement with the natural world.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Writer and singer Tallack (Sixty Degrees North) dives into his decades of fly-fishing in this incandescent work about the restorative power of nature. "For me, the desire to catch fish is the opposite of simple," Tallack writes, "and at its root is not an eagerness to kill or to capture at all... a quite different instinct: an intense, focused curiosity." Employing that intense curiosity here, he blends his personal history with a cultural investigation of fly-fishing, and, more specifically, its ability to lure people in. As he wades from 1980s East Sussex, where his "fixation" with fishing began, to the trout-filled waters he fished until his thirties in Shetland, he offers philosophical musings on the "flow state" induced by angling—a "combination of repetitive, purposeful movement... and a focused, optimistic mindset" that's been known to reduce depression—and reminisces in lyrical prose on his many voyages, including trips to the River Devon's "rushing waterfalls and... wide, languorous stretches." Later chapters evoke the ambient threat of climate change and industrial pollution, noting, among other things, how Britain's once-fecund chalk streams are being "choked life" due to massive amounts of untreated sewage discharged from local water companies. Never didactic or sentimental, his prose winds its way through inner and outer terrains, rendering sparkling meditations at every turn. This casts the life aquatic in a wondrous light.
