Fishing Stories

Long ago when the waters of the world were still young and the fishes that lived in them held a new fascination for men, a hunter-gatherer told the first fishing story. Although fishing for survival is dying out, the tradition of telling fishing stories lives on. In this collection of forty fishing stories, previously published in the first ten volumes of The Fishing & Hunting Journal, twenty-nine authors share their fishing dreams, adventures and accounts of life on the water. Set mostly in Africa, they cover everything from wild times with tarpon in tropical seas to introspective tales of trout in mountain trickles. Whether you have a passion for marlin, mudfish, or mullet, deep down fishing is one language and these are some of its stories.

The quality of the prose, content and humour in Fishing Stories for Africa is outstanding. Here are three quotes from the book to help illustrate:

The sunset over the town was smudged red and black and grey like the dying coals of a braai fire.

David Butler. From the chapter, Domkrag.

…and that the river is, in a sense, a metaphor for my life, perhaps all lives. We are streams flowing from the mountains, tumbling down over riffles and falls, shaded in parts by deep cuts and chasms, warmed by the sandstone, sometimes resting in dark, dour pools. Life’s seasons come and go and we flow, sometimes strongly, sometimes less so. The river will change through time as it flows to the sea because that is the nature of rivers. I understand now that I have been deeply etched by rivers.

Mick Mitchley. From the chapter, Etching the River. 

Summer in the Northern Cape is not for sissies. Being experienced in coping with the heat and the dust, my father, my uncle and I sought refuge in an air-conditioned room one afternoon. It happened to be the local bar, but was preferable to the other air-conditioned room, which was the dentist’s reception area.

Wim Els. From the chapter, Karl Gives the Angling Spot.

Click here to read this book’s review by Tom Sutcliffe