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View Full Version : To fish or not to fish--just ask Shakespeare


«°Ñøvã°»
12-24-2005, 08:22 AM
Of course, Shakespeare was a fisher, if not a flyfisher. The Shire of Far Reaches (http://www.farreaches.org/fishing/shakes/shakes.html) site has interesting speculations on William's fishing (as well as a great history of fishing in general), as seen through the eyes of his poetry. According to scholars, the poet knew about everything happening in his culture, to the point that some have questioned the bard's existence (He knew too much?)

A hundred years had passed since the publishing of Dame Juliana Berner's "Treatyse on Fysshynge wyth an Angle". It seems to me, with the paucity of book publishing at the time, any book is going to embrace fairly common practices and interests to survive, especially if it is attached to a book on farming (which it was). Shakespeare must have sensed all this as he took the pulse of the land and lords--no doubt while lounging on a mossy rock, rod in hand, dabbling a red wool fly, waiting for a trout to break his reveries. Go Bill.

stonedfly
12-24-2005, 03:47 PM
.........nerd

flycookin
12-24-2005, 05:52 PM
Good one Nova would never have guest that, coming from the commonwealth!

Sumner Newman
12-24-2005, 10:58 PM
Nice, Nova. Now I know why I spend about 4 days each summer at the Utah Shakespearean Festival in Cedar. Great plays and great entertainment! So Billy the Bard was an angler, you say? Of course, he was! Had he not been an angler, he'd surely not been as insightful, introspective and positively brilliant a man as he was!

UtahFlyGuy
12-25-2005, 02:41 AM
Jerry, thanks for the insight.