BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)

Subject: BS: Trout Fishing in America
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 02:11 AM

Has anyone read ' Trout Fishing in America ' by Richard Brautigan ?

I picked this up in an Oxfam shop somewhere thinking it was a fishing book, it's not really about fishing but an extremely funny surreal journey.

eric

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigam)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 03:14 AM

Hmmm. I thought this was about the music group "Trout Fishing in America" (who are pretty good, by the way). No, it's about the book, which was kind of a cult classic. I started to read it, but got bored.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigam)
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 03:30 AM

I was a big fan back in my college days. Brautigan had a unique world view. He had a book of poetry called Rommel Drives On Deep into Egypt which is worth seeking out, although there is nothing in it related to Rommel, or Egypt for that matter.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 04:49 AM

Surely the group took it's name from Richard Brautigans book ?

eric

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigam)
From: GUEST,Dani
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:49 AM

Me, too, Joe! They're one of my all-time favorite bands! Hardly a day goes by I don't sing "Boiled Okra and Spinach"!

I might have known that a man of your discerning taste would be a fan.

Dani

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigam)
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:50 AM

Trout Fishing in America was almost a bible to some people I knew in the '70s. I read it and other of Brautigan's books, but I don't think I did quite enough drugs to really "understand" them.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigam)
From: GUEST,Dani
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:51 AM

Turns out they did take their name from the book, though. Who knew?!

Dani

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 09:47 AM

I second what Bee-dubya-ell said -- I read it and most of Richard Brautigan's other books in the early '70s. Still got copies of most of them, but haven't re-read any including TFIA. I remember enjoying it, but certainly can't give you any details.

I remember, too, that I got a kick out of a band naming itself after the book -- but, then again, I get a kick out of ANY musical group name with literary/cultural references. (I loved the name Pioneers of Modern Typography, but, then again, I was a typographer at the time.)

Linn

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: Alice
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 09:47 AM

He lived near me. He was very drunk the last time I saw him. He committed suicide a couple weeks after that. His writing was overrated in my opinion. My fellow students who were stoned or drunk most of the time thought the book was great. His idea that women taking birth control were causing a disaster of unborn children was really offensive to a lot of women.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: Rapparee
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 09:52 AM

Having read all of his stuff, hoping against hope that the next would be better, I have to agree with Alice. It was a cult classic, back in the day, but over-rated.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: Sorcha
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 12:04 PM

I read the book, owned it at one time. Be damned if I can remember one thing about it now, except that I didn't 'get it'.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: Alice
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 12:32 PM

Don't worry, Sorcha. There was nothing to "get"! LOL

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigam)
From: Bee
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 02:47 PM

I read it, and really liked it, back in the '70s. He was a very messed up man, though.

It seemed to me that there were a fair number of more avante garde male writers and artists around in the seventies who were more or less hostile to women in general. I was acquainted with quite a few of the more famous of that lot, on the art side, through the seventies. Some of them loved women and were whole-heartedly supportive of women in the arts, but a notable (and influential) few were angry and resentful and frequently made women who had anything to do with them, personally or professionally, miserable.

One, who is a well-known senior American-Canadian artist with works in every major gallery from here to New York, was a first year art college prof of mine. The first class we had, he looked around the class and said: "I see a lot of women here. Women do not become artists. You are wasting my time and your money by bothering to come to this college." At the time, a man could get away with that crap.

Every time he has a show in a gallery I can get to, I drop in for five minutes and write derogatory (and truthful) comments in the guestbook about the derivative to the point of plagiarism and artistically bankrupt nature of his paintings. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 05:08 PM

Correct spelling in the thread title, please!

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: GUEST,Fantasma
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 06:15 PM

Well, it was the 60s San Francisco, and he was a social misfit among the social misfits. He never really fit in with the Diggers, though he did try. Hung w/some of the Beats (speaking of avant garde misogynist dudes, there were a number of them among them & the Diggers too).

His writing was mediocre, nothing special. In many ways he became trendy like a lot of other so-called "cult" personalities of the era.

But he was really just another damaged human abused by Catholic alcoholic parents. A story that resonates with millions of Catholics, which is why I thought his writing was popular among the wandering tribe of damaged Catholic flower children back in the day.

His poetry truly, truly sucked.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: M.Ted
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:12 PM

We've had our differences before, Bee, but I want you to know that, after that telling that story, you are my new hero. It is all too easy to forget how appalling sexist the Intellectuals and artists of the 60's often were.

As to Brautigan, his books of poetry are entertaining, in a Julia A. Moore sort of way--his writings shine with unwarranted confidence, which makes them a delight to read. If you are so inclined, check this Poems of Richard Brautigan

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigam)
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:34 PM

By the way, Brautigan's body was not discovered until about six weeks after his suicide. He must have become a real SOB to be able to lie dead for six weeks without anyone caring enough to even check on him.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: M.Ted
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 09:57 PM

I think that it is quite sad that he died as he did, and lay dead and undiscovered for so long. I'm not sure that that means he was an SOB. More accurate to say that he was profoundly troubled.

He was an alcoholic, had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and treated for it with shock therapy, and, grew up in an abusive family situation. At a certain point, he became reclusive. Bolinas, where he died, is, or was at that time, a place for reclusive people of various types.

This thread has tended toward disparagement, so I should point out that there has been a relatively recent reawakening of literary interest in his works. He may not have been a great writer, but his work is interesting. He has a unique point of view, a direct and terse style, and is often quite funny.

It may have been Lawrence Ferlinghetti who said that Brautigan understood trout better than than he understood people. That is quite a shortcoming, for a writer, but nobodies perfect.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: Bee
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 10:07 AM

I read someone's biography of Brautigan after his death, and as I remember his not being found had to do with his withdrawing from contact rather than being an unpleasant person.

I'm no hero, M.Ted, but thank you for being aware of where we've come from and how we got here.

Another example of male establishment artists' attitudes follows, and perhaps it is a comment on how different publicly known personas (like Brautigan's) may be from the real person.

I met Shulamith Firestone shortly after her Dialectics of Sex was published in 1970. She was only 25 when she wrote it, and it is still considered by many to be one of the most radical and influential of feminist books, advocating as she did the abolition of pregnancy itself. She was part of the founding of several of the most radical American feminist organizations through the seventies, and has been roundly criticised for the extreme nature of her politics and was accused by the groups she helped originate of having an ego the size of Godzilla.

That may be true, but when I met her, I found her to be a lovely person, compassionate, impulsively kind, and oddly shy, given the harsh light her activities placed her under. She was invited to speak at the art college where I was a student - part of an effort by the administration to quell the rising protests of women students that the place was hostile to women (no kidding). Her speech wouldn't have sounded particularly radical to anyone listening today, and consisted mostly, as I remember it, of pointing out the glaring inequalities faced by women in the arts. I mostly remember that I felt excited and inspired by her words.

But afterwards, when I went looking for her to say thank you, I found her cornered by four male professors, all of them extremely angry, one to the point of shouting at her and calling her names. She was a slender, slightly built, almost elfin looking woman,
and all of the men looked huge next to her. Myself and a male student stepped in and took her out of there. She was frankly shaken by the depth of their anger, and so was I. I spent the rest of the evening with her and some other students, and also part of the next day until she had to leave. I liked her very much, and feel privileged to have met her.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shulamith_Firestone

http://www.amazon.ca/Airless-Spaces-Shulamith-Firestone/dp/customer-reviews/1570270821/ref=cm_cr_dp_all_helpful/701-4134743-9808

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: gnu
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 02:05 PM

I read Trout Magic years ago and I highly recommend it. It's about trout fishing. Must read it again soon.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: EBarnacle
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:21 PM

As with several others, I read TFIA at the time it was hot. I even read one or two other books of his. None of them got reread. They were not interesting or amusing enough.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: M.Ted
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:29 PM

Well, Bee, one more miracle and you're eligible for Sainthood--I love that story even more than the other.

Revolutionary movements require two very different types of activity-first, the vision must be expressed, clearly, directly, and believably. Second, the people must be organized and directed in a way that they can realize the vision. Very few people are good at both--

I doubt very much that Shulie Firestone was Godzilla, or anything other than the person that you've described here--a thoughtful speculative philosopher who, by the force of her own vision, was thrust into a position of having to organize a lot of very angry women, and at the same time to stand against a lot of angry men. Not many could deal with that situation very well.

In a way, she reminds me of Grace Metalious--in that her writing made her both famous and reviled in a way that she never could have been anticipated, and was never prepared to deal with.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: Bee
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 06:35 PM

M.Ted, I pretty much agree with everything you just said - I don't know for sure how SF would have felt about the comparison to GM - but probably not too bad!

Not miracles, though, I think - just luck, place, and timing. I did, in a very few years, in a time of many cultural changes, meet a surprising number of people whose art and lives are still being talked about and written about, though not always in a positive vein.

Makes me an interesting, if eccentric, old aunt to my intelligent neices, that's the real value!

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: M.Ted
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 08:28 PM

SF came out better than GM--at least insofar as that she was not totally destroyed by her creation--my father was a New Englander, and in his home town, people were evenly divided, either taking her work as a personal attack on everything they held sacred, or applauding her for having the courage to expose small town hypocrisy--

Anyway, both SF and GM figure prominently in Womens Studies, because after all these years, their writing still hits hard--

As to art and lives, it is very interesting to see what is still being talked about, and what has been cast aside. In a certain way,   a lot of what I remember is being rewritten--the real feeling of the times is being forgotten, and it is being recast to reflect what people want to remember.

Our obligation may simply be to tell what we know to have been true.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 05:10 PM

I thouroughly enjoyed that book when I encoutered it, probably in the early-to-mid 80's... the editor had predicted, or thejacket blurb had, that novels would by our time be called "brautigans" - but I've never met anyone who had heard of it, although many knew of the band, which I hadn't.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautiga
From: M.Ted
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 06:04 PM

There was a time, back in the Seventies, when no self-respecting college town yard sale was complete without a copy of "Trout Fishing in America"--I don't remember the line about "brautigans", it sounds more like a kind of sausage than a novel, though--

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: PoppaGator
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 06:17 PM

I remember "TFIA" being recommended to me, and eventually reading it without much enthusiasm. I wanted to like it ~ especially because I was living in Bolinas at the time ~ but it left me kinda cold.

I didn't know that Catholicism was part of RB's troubled life. As a "fallen-away Catholic" myself (I personally prefer the phrase "gotten-away"), I might have been able to read his stuff with a bit more sympathy.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: GUEST,Willy Nilly
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 06:24 PM

Whenever I think about Richard Brautigan, these days, I'm reminded of the following words from the Sandy Denny song, Autopsy, from the Fairport Convention album, Unhalfbricking.

You must philosophise,
But why must you bore me to tears?

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: Uke
Date: 19 Aug 12 - 05:22 AM

Just re-reading some of RB's books and reading others for the first time. So was interested to find this thread.

I wasn't even around in the 1960s, but I like his stuff. The writing is well crafted, unsentimental and has some subtle humour. Often little jokes that are easy to miss.

'In Watermelon Sugar' I found genuinely strange. That said, 'The Hawkline Monster' felt a bit forced to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Trout Fishing in America (Richard Brautigan)
From: Amos
Date: 19 Aug 12 - 10:15 AM

''If you get hung up on everybody else's hang-ups, then the whole world's going to be nothing more than one huge gallows.''
Richard Brautigan (1935-1984)


I Cannot Answer You Tonight in Small Portions

I cannot answer you tonight in small portions.
Torn apart by stormy loves gate, I float
like a phantom facedown in a well where
the cold dark water reflects vague half-built
stars
and trades all our affection, touching, sleeping
together for tribunal distance standing like
a drowned train just beyond a pile of Eskimo
skeletons.



From 'The Pill v. the Springhill Mine Disaster.'