Angling Quotations

[Guest NigelT]

One of my favourite quotes is actually a caption to a photograph in 'The Deepening Pool'

 

"The only time in my life I will catch my first barbel"

 

I still remember catching my first barbel, a 61/2lb fish from the swale. The power of that fish and the way my old glass Richard Walker rod bent through to the corks - unforettable.

[Guest Clive]

Two from me :

 

Jim Gibbinson in his book `Top Ten' when referring to the fact that he had not included a section on `Specimen' Dace. He concluded that dace come in three sizes ` Too big for pike baits, too small for pike baits and just right!'

 

Two mates on the bank comparing strengths of different betalight isotopes, both cupped the betalights in their hands, one responded `Yours is shining brighter - your shading out more of the darkness!'

 

It's why we go fishing - so unpredicable.

 

Clive Dennison

 

[This message has been edited by Clive (edited 31 July 2001).]

[Guest The Bream Enjin]

see below : John Wilson, Go Fishing

 

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"And they are called boobies heheheh for obvious reasons"

[Guest PaulRudd]

"I ask a simple question,

The truth I only wish

Are all fisherman liars?

Or do all liars fish?!"

 

AND

 

"God grant me strength to catch a fish,

So large that even I,

When telling of it afterwards,

May never need to lie!"

 

Taken from two old plates which used to belong to my Grandad,has anyone else seen these??

Paul

 

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Paul Rudd

[Guest Graham E]

When we had a thread regards "Best Books" I stated mine was "The Deepening Pool"

Reading the quotes listed in Chris's great thread, I guess I will have to get it out again and read it, again for the 50th time!!

 

[This message has been edited by Graham E (edited 31 July 2001).]

[Guest Graham E]

This is not a quote as such but the last few lines of

"Walking away from the Thames" by John Ginifer. It is the last story in CY's River Prince.

 

"What followed was inevitable, yet almost bizarre. The rod bent deeply, with the reel jerking and scraping a terrible tune; I plunged bankside into the soft, silted reedbed, to gain precious yards, for by now the force on the line was crippling.

With a final screech, the Mitchell jammed tight and the line broke at the top ring like a gunshot, leaving a faint puff of vapour drifting on the evening air.

For the briefest moment, the unconnected line lay like a snake on the surface before slithering into the deeps, leaving me utterly alone.

I heard my pleading softly echo from the the walls and fences of Oxford: "Oh. No. No. No. "

 

I can feel the pain in this one!

 

 

 

[This message has been edited by Graham E (edited 31 July 2001).]

[Guest NigelT]

Those coarse anglers who have never read anything by the american author John Gierach are surely missing out. He is very philosophical about his fly fishing but his books are well worth reading. I have Just bought a second hand copy (£4.00)of 'Standing in a River Waving a Stick)- great title.

 

Two quotes from this book I like are;

 

"The solution to any problem-work,love,money,whatever- IS TO GO FISHING, and the worse the problem, the longer the trip should be."

 

And a quote John attributes to Tom McGuane;

 

"Angling is extremely time consuming. that's sort of the whole point,"

 

The last quote reminds me of the often used quote which is used in many forms;

 

"The gods do not take from a life the time one spends fishing"

 

I too have heard the quote about fisherman being liars, I once used it in a best man's speech!!

[Guest poledark]

Here's a lttle quote I read a short while ago,

"is it me or is this forum 'the place to be' at the moment?.......Gaffer,AN, 28/06/01

[Guest Chris Plumb]

Thought I'd bring this back to life as reading through I realised we had nothing by Bernard Venables and we can't have that can we? Any way here's a couple of pieces to enjoy....

 

From the Summer section of Mr Crabtree goes Fishing...

 

However much immersed in his fishing the angler is, he cannot be indifferent to the activities of the many creatures around him. He has the amplest opportunity to see them, for he is such a still figure that he is not heeded by the lake’s inhabitants.

They come and go, regarding him no more than if he were a stump. He sees the mallard duck shepherding her half-grown family on intent but apparently endless journeys over the water, folding the glassy surface into oily crinkles. The kingfisher drops from its bough over the water, exploding it into momentary fragments. Then it reappears, a tiny fish gripped in its beak.

The heron lifts heavily from the shallows, its trailing legs seeming hard to carry. The swans preen and arch, and inspect the fisherman with an arrogant stare, leaving him unmolested only because he is so still. Sudden little clusters of fry break from the surface in a terrified flurry. A perch is feeding.

 

And this is from the first edition of Waterlog...

 

Why, it may be asked, do we go fishing? Easily we may say because we enjoy it; easily but inadequately. Our enjoyment has profound roots inseparably attached to the vast interknitted rhythms of life on earth. We are of earth; as every butterfly and bug and fish and flower is of earth so are we. We have no glory which is not of earth. From earth we come, to earth we return. In fishing as in few other things we have the keenest - indeed ecstatic - sense of this most worshipful relationship.

 

And this theme was echoed by BRIAN CLARKE in his excellent tribute in The Times - here's an extract...

 

Venables was devoid of pretension. He wanted to be buried in a cardboard box, seeing his return to the earth as just another dust-speck on the turning wheel of time and felt that to use anything else would be pointless. But it was not to be. When he was lowered into the pure, white chalk, it was in a more appropriate way: in a wicker basket made to take his own tiny frame, as light and natural a coffin as one of Old Izaak's creels.

At the precise moment of his burial, the heavens opened and a wind-driven rain riveted down. Someone said "typical angling weather" and we smiled and nodded before drifting away. A few held back. One old friend dropped a traditional cork float onto Bernard's creel. Another dropped down an

artificial mayfly. Someone else dropped a second mayfly and someone else a small slip of wood which, he later said, had long ago been harvested from the garden of Walton's Staffordshire cottage. Minutes later, a blackbird, gripping its swaying cherry branch tightly, burst into full-throated song. It was as if the clouds had parted and the sun had come out.

 

 

You can still read the entire eulogy on line at.... http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,35-126922,00.html

 

Chris

 

 

 

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"Study to be quiet."

[Guest Chris Plumb]

And another, similar to the fisherman's prayer....

 

Bragging may not bring happiness, but no man having caught a great fish goes home via a dark alley!

 

 

Chris

 

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"Study to be quiet."