Re-Visiting “The Book”

Ask any number of fly fishermen today how their obsession started, and a majority will point back to 1992 when Redford’s movie “A River Runs Through It” was released.  However, before there was “The Movie,” there was “the book.”

As should all anglers, Quinn at Chi Wulff revisited Maclean’s classic recently and found the story, and prose, as good as it was in 1976 when it was originally published. In the 25th anniversary edition, Annie Proulx opines that it was Maclean’s ability to describe the physical workings of items that made him special.  But one might argue, and Quinn agrees, that it was Maclean’s ability to capture emotion in words and how those feelings relate to fly fishing and the natural beauty surrounding the sport.  In today’s run-and-gun, grip-and-grin, more-is-more environment, we need more reminders to pause and bring it all in. The book still does that.