The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton [Hardcover]

James Prosek (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 7, 1999

"Izaak Walton was my excuse to go to England. I had been thinking through ideas to get money from Yale in the form of a traveling fellowship for two years, and several attempts had failed. My last--and best--idea was to suggest to the fellowship committee that I go to England and fish in the footsteps of a legitimate seventeenth-century author, Izaak Walton, who wrote "The Compleat Angler, " the third most frequently reprinted book in the English language, one that has been in print for over three hundred years. I told them during my interview that Walton's words spoke to me, that fishing was my passion, and that his book represented and defended every facet of the art more lucidly than I ever could." -- James Prosek

James Prosek has been called "the Audubon of the fishing world" by the "New York Times." A passionate fisherman and talented artist from a young age, he published two illustrated books on fish and fishing while still an undergraduate at Yale. After winning a traveling fellowship to follow in the footsteps of Izaak Walton, "The Compleat Angler" became his obsession. He was fascinated by Walton, a humble man who won the friendship of kings, and he was intrigued by the book's philosophies concerning the timelessness and immortality that could be achieved by fishing. Although Walton was sixty when "The Compleat Angler" was published and Prosek only twenty when he set off to visit England, they each had traits in common: a love of fishing and an extraordinary ability to make friends.

This is thestory of a young man's pilgrimage through England, fishing the waters that are now privately held. Along with wonderful stories about good times, great fishing, and fine eating, this trip becomes an exploration of Waltonian ideals: how to live with humor, wisdom, contentment, and simplicity.

The original watercolors complementing the text are wonderful. Like Walton's book, "The Complete Angler" is "not" about fishing but about life. Or rather, it "is" about fishing--but fishing is life.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Prosek has commandeered a unique branch for himself in the long stream of fishing literature. With Trout: An Illustrated History and Joe and Me, he's reeled in the reputation of a modern-day Audubon with a keen eye that translates experience into both words and watercolors. In The Complete Angler, he sets out to tackle the legacy of Isaak Walton, the granddaddy of littoral lit and his 17th-century classic, The Compleat Angler. While still an undergraduate, Prosek convinces the solons at Yale to fund a traveling fellowship for him to fish the waters Walton fished, to ponder their joint obsession with angling, and the fellowship and philosophies inherent in sitting on banks with a rod in your hand. "Fishing is my religion and the trout stream is my temple," Prosek declares proudly, which makes Walton at least a High Priest, if not the Messiah.

You certainly can't accuse Prosek of shrinking from a challenge. Walton's Compleat Angler is one of the towers of English literature. Not only the third most reprinted volume in the language (after the Bible and Shakespeare), it is the rare book that has spanned several centuries of readership without ever going out of print. Stepping into Walton's waders--literary and sporting--and fishing his way through public and private waters throughout Britain, Prosek attempts to navigate deeper, trickier currents than he's previously attempted. What he catches is part homage, part pilgrimage, part meditation, and entirely alluring--a work that balances youthful exuberance with insight and depth. Walton's considerable shadow challenges and encourages Prosek's growth as writer and artist; both his writing and the painting that illustrates this handsome effort are maturing. "I didn't exactly know what I would find," Prosek admits at the start. It's precisely this attitude that makes his journey, and the surprises he snares, all the more enchanting. --Jeff Silverman

From Publishers Weekly

Prosek (Trout) recounts the adventures he had while fulfilling both his love of fly-fishing and the requirements of his senior college thesis. Traveling on a grant, he roved the English countryside, visiting significant landmarks and streams in the life of Izaak Walton, the 17th-century angler and writer who penned The Compleat Angler, the book considered by many to be the definitive work on the sport. Prosek envisions his own work as "a popular, not entirely scholarly piece, with hopes that Walton's works may enjoy more readers." Indeed, there is much careful research into Walton's life. Prosek is particularly interested in the idea that Walton came to think of angling as his religion, much as Prosek does himself, but he realizes that while biography reveals almost as much about the writer as it does about the subject, such a neat comparison could well be romantic and wishful thinking. Prosek points out that Walton, an adherent of the Church of England, wrote his own book after fleeing London during the English Civil War, and one Walton scholar makes a case that Walton's book was really a coded polemic whose proper title was The Compleat Anglican. In any event, Prosek's take could aptly be named The Compleat Anglophile (which Prosek admits to being), and at times the proper tone and borrowed British idioms are pretentious. The book's charm, however, lies in its quiet realism, both in Prosek's honest reflections and in his vivid paintings, which accompany the text. 18 full-color plates. Author tour.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Harper; First Edition. 1 in number line edition (April 7, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060191899
• ISBN-13: 978-0060191894
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 8.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #244,087 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

James Prosek is a writer and artist whose books include Trout: An Illustrated History; Joe and Me: An Education in Fishing and Friendship; The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton; and Fly-Fishing the 41st. He lives in Easton, Connecticut.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars not-so-deep thoughts, April 26, 2000

By 

Matthew L. Miller - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton (Hardcover)

This book tries very hard to be "deep" and insightful; it is neither. This is not a book about the human condition; it is a book about a privileged young man fishing with privileged old people.

Prosek does lovely paintings, but the bottom line is that his writing lacks maturity. He violates many rules that should have been drilled into his head during "freshman comp" class. He doesn't show, he tells. He overuses flowery adjectives. And he can be melodramatic to the extreme.

There is no shortage of books about flyfishing that are filled with overblown prose, books that try to make flyfishing something it is not. This book is one of them.

Comparisons to Izaak Walton abound. This gets old after a while. So do the many "characters" Prosek fishes with, who we are told are very interesting and "quite delightful," but most seemed to be pompous, bland individuals.

For some reason, the trip itself bothered me. He got to fish many rivers only because he was a young man of privilege. Everyone he meets is awed by him, mainly because he is an Ivy Leaguer with the right connections. He then makes sure we know that the class-obsessed people he meet complimented him on his "class" and "character." He seems to revel in this, never examining his privilege. Many times I wanted him to quit rhapsodizing over trout and start examining his own life.

I was very disappointed in Prosek as a writer. It lacks the depth of a good travel book (like Fen Montaigne's "Reeling in Russia"). And he can't compare to sporting writers like McGuane, Bodio, Tom McIntyre and Robert F. Jones, all writers whose books reflect fierce joy, love, pain, conflict, and ambiguity.

I understand Prosek is now writing about love. Be very afraid.

25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars For a painter he's a good writer..., August 24, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton (Hardcover)

Let's face it, this is not a very good book. There is a tendency among those who fly fish to readily accept any ink put to paper as elegaic, contemplative and downright superior. Young Mr. Prosek is a fortunate lad, having pulled the wool over the eyes of the academic sachems at Yale to bless his fly fishing vacation in England as the subject of his thesis. He wraps the proposal in the esteemed pages of Izaak Walton's The Compleat Angler, the most purchased and least read book in the history of print. Prosek forces us to wade through a number of English rivers and some tedious prose, and in this respect he does resemble Walton. His constant comparisons of himself to Walton tend to bog down his writing. He ruminates on how he is standing in the same water that Walton once stood, the worst kind of conceit. You don't even stand in the same river yourself when you happen to be standing in one! The only redeeming feature of this volume is that it is beautiful book, with Prosek's watercolors generously peppered throughout. He is a gifted painter and his first book is one of my favorites. This volume, however, has more of the red herring about it than the noble trout. I admire a good con job, I just hate it when it's pulled on me.

11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Beyond fishing-ripples of a sweet life., April 27, 1999

By 

Patricia A. Pendergast (Along the Connecticut River) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton (Hardcover)

James Prosek has crafted three books around trout fishing. I'm not a fisherwoman, I'm a birdwatcher, card carrying enviro-lobbyist with complex affinities for hunting and fishing. I bought his first book because he was supporting a cause I cared about and it was a pleasure to look at. Prozek's renderings of trout are jewel toned. Fascination will strip away all pretensions because it feeds so greedily. Hypersensitive, you seek all nourishment to supplement the core hunger. James Prozek in his youth celebrates his fascination for trout, and the art of troutfishing. I am now trying to learn how to watch fish. The Compleat Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton finds Prozek searching further. He's looking for his place in space, senses heightened by his passion for troutfishing and the need to make his way in the world. His affinity with Izzak Walton is natural. Izzak Walton, in uncertain times (17th century England) used his fascination for fishing to make sense of his world. This book is savory with the manchild's gleanings of people and life in a familiar foreign land. It's a good thing he is in love with life, because he notices so many things: food, architecture, gardens, dairy maid, weather and people with a generous spirit. The book is fun to read because he is always 'there' - diffident and cocky, smart and rueful, testing and accepting. History and always fishing provide the backdrop to each vignette...encounters that inevitably lead to the next pool. The book's few faults have to do with the youth of the author, so they really can't be faults now. Prozek works hard and is productive. His watercolors are gorgeous. He is growing and I will watch for his future boooks as benchmarks. Spend some time with this young man; stray with him. Reaffirm that the nature around us is the foundation for the condition of all things human.