I TRAVELLED much farther than planned and fared worse than I hoped. The romantic notion to trace the footsteps of angler and writer HT Sheringham, taken more than a century before along the Thames at Isleworth, came to me several years ago. My original idea, set aside along with so many other things, was to take the train to Richmond as he'd done, cross the former deer park and walk down the east bank towards the old ferry, perhaps through the trees that sheltered the lovers he observed as he strolled homeward in the peace that follows a happy fishing trip. On a recent visit to Kew Gardens, I looked upstream from the boundary viewpoint to the shingle banks where Sheringham fished for dace, and there made up my mind to go on the pilgrimage, with a fly-rod, to see whether dace are still to be caught on black gnats from this reach of the tidal Thames.
My first reading of Sheringham came from the compilation with a foreword by Tom Fort, in which he declared him to be the finest of all the fishing authors. At the time I was not so sure: Ransome had an equal claim, I felt, certainly on the grounds of prose style. Yet now I've read much of Sheringham's best work, I am inclined to agree. A good writer is an artist, and the object of art is to capture the essence of life; through his recognition of the darker as well as the celebratory moments of a fisherman, Sheringham raised his writing well above the normal fare. Among writers whose main oeuvre was fishing, I can think of no other who achieved this. Nor has anyone matched his lugubrious wit.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة July 2023 من The Field.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة July 2023 من The Field.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
Helping hot dogs chill out
From cool coats to clippers, there are a whole host of ways to keep your canine companion comfortable as the summer heat intensifies, says David Tomlinson
Art in the field
Sculpting his wild subjects from life, Fred Gordon is breaking new ground in bronze, says Janet Menzies
How to canapé
A summer celebration is nothing without these tiny works of art. Devised by the country's best canapé cooks, they are just the thing to make your party swing
Ginger-beer childhoods
Summer holidays filled with outdoor adventures are the perfect way to foster a love of the countryside and a lifetime enthusiasm for the field
Glamour, intelligence and drive as standard
Retrieving birds with pace, energy and undeniable elan, these sporting poodles are winning over even traditional gundog breed enthusiasts
The cycle begins
Though it may lie forgotten for much of the year, the kennel bicycle is indispensable in summer when hound exercise gets under way
Turning the tide on the Tyne
The industrial age brought prosperity to Newcastle but at great cost to the Tyne and its salmon. Today its waters are a haven for fish and anglers alike
En garde: a guide to fencing
Not just a clash of swords and some fancy footwork, this ancient sport is an art form that demands agility, discipline and control
Who was Baron Pierre de Coubertin?
It was a diminutive, 19th-century French aristocrat, Baron Pierre de Coubertin (pictured, left), who came up with the idea of reviving the Olympic Games while studying in Paris. He was a sporting sort himself, and had also long despaired of what he perceived as French degeneracy; his country had been humiliated by the loss of the Franco-Prussian War and he attributed this to his countrymen's lack of moral fibre.
A gold-medal guide to Olympic shooting
Everything you need to know, from history, disciplines, rules and regulations to the British sportsmen and women striving for glory