Richard Gorodecky has produced a little masterpiece in his recent book.
When I heard Richard being interviewed by Pete Tyjas on the FlyCulture podcast I quickly decided that his book should move to the top slot on my long wish list of book titles. Serendipitously, I had a good pal visiting the UK, so was able to hatch a plan to get the book back to South Africa without the usual courier fees . [Courier fees to SA typically amount to more than the value of the item you are buying, and since we no longer have a postal service to speak of, you want a good travelling friend to be your mule!]
I was not disappointed.
“This book is about nature, adventure, escape, respite, friendship, solitude, belonging, not belonging, wonder, and monumental stupidity and absurdity” Writes the author in the introduction. Like so much else within the book, I think he nails it with this summary. More and more I find myself enjoying fishing books which are not actually about fishing at all. So much so that I wrote one of those myself.
But where this book does so well, is in the parts he so skillfully left out. I mean that in the sense that you get a window on his entire life of flyfishing by reading just these ten chapters which he has written. It is very evident as you read along that he has chosen to skip from the top of one wave to another in the dialogue, but in a way that makes it clear that there is a lot of fished water in-between. The third chapter of the book speaks to the naming of the author’s new home in Ireland, wherein he recognises the silence between the musical notes. What he did there, so very cleverly, was to encourage the reader to consider the gaps between his chapters and what they might encompass. But when one is not considering those gaps you can immerse yourself in the deep dives of the various locations, characters and settings to which he takes you. In these, his more than quirky description of a rocking chair on a fishing lodge porch, or his way of estimating fish size, will paint mental pictures of enduring delight. In one chapter he enters an ‘Alice in Wonderland’-like tunnel to reach the water and “keeps his eyes peeled for rabbits with pocket watches and Cheshire cats”. And not unlike Boo Gilbraith’s “Lamont”, Gorodecky has his own “Derek” who sets fire to his sleeping bag. He talks of anglers waiting at airport luggage conveyor belts and being reunited with their tackle as “a truly beautiful thing”. He visits a psychic and he runs out of money in Cuba.
And I am going to stop there lest I ruin it for you. If you want to read one of those books which ends too quickly and of which you just want more, then this is one you should get hold of.
And if you want to get a look into the depth of the man, you can watch his YouTube video “Riverman”, and although its off the topic of a fishing website, watch “Little Shit” too, because it talks to a deeply human perception of and sensitivity to, this world of struggling humans who would do well to “be still and go a fishing”.
