The gentle art of angling

Bernard Venables blev 94 år gammal- och han gick ur tiden år 2001. Då hade han skrivit flera mycket poetiska böcker om "långsamhetens lov" vad gäller fiske. "A Stream of Life" är hans självbiografi men lika  känd är Venables kanske för de här minnena:

Jag läser om Venables i Luke Jennings betraktelser över fäder, vänskap och fiske "Blood Knots"- en verklig levnadskonstens historia.

Luke Jennings citerar Venables som är ute och fiskar efter öring i Themsen:

"A little before the time, which will often be in the evening, the angler will be there, ready for his chance. This is a transient but immortal piece of time: the sun will have fallen behind the mantled downs, the air will be heavy with that evening scent of water that can conjure a sort of madness in the fisherman. A smell is not an easy thing to carry in the memory, but an angler exiled anywhere can recall it from the fabric of his mind and in a moment be enraptured. The water will be dark now, purple and dusky cobalt, richly green and amber in the shallows, the clots of foam will be turned to blue... Moments are hours, the bark of a distant dog hardly noticed at the time, will be found afterwards to be lodged immovable in the memory."

Från Venables dödsruna hämtar jag följande rader:

"His philosophy was a little out of step with the signs and developments of the modern angling scene, which he observed with some disquiet. For him, fishing was not just an absorbing and delightful sport, but also an escape from the cares of modern life and a calm to the soul. He was not much in sympathy with the commercialisation, competitiveness and obsession with technical gadgetry that have become such a part of fishing today. "