The Run

by Hohn Hay, David Gross (Illustrator)

Clean cover has only mild wear. Pages are mildly tanned, but otherwise clean and unmarked. Ships fast from California.

Genres: Nature, Animals

Paperback

First published November 30, 1975

Reviews

[Nelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Classic nature writing. A personal favorite (it is about my study species, after all, and about ecology I have spent most of my life steeped in) that I re read this time of year in honor both of these fish and their spring spawning migration, but also for my friend with whom I shared a love of all of this, and took more than once to take part in citizen science counting these fish on their way inland in a little river in Maine.

“It is not I think, incongruous to apply the word love to a cold-blooded fish. In this spawning act there is an imperative rhythm, with grace in its preparation and power in its fulfillment.”

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slow-paced, gentleman-poet-naturalist style. Quite reminiscent of The Outermost House. Sometimes, I think I was born in the wrong era.

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been visiting Cape Cod for 60+ years, and I follow several Cape Cod related Instagram accounts. This spring one of the people I follow challenged folks to read John Hay's The Run to fully appreciate and understand Cape Cod nature, specifically the life habits of the alewives. I accepted the challenge and loved this book.

All these years I have walked the Brewster-Harwich area and kayaked ponds and the Herring River almost unaware of all the action going on under me. Sure, I knew herring runs existed, but I never saw the alewives or understood their journey from salt water to ponds and back. Mr. Hay's description of the challenges, danger, and beauty of alewives' lives read like a novel. This book turned up my awareness and curiosity of nature a notch. It offered me a more robust, vigorous understanding of Cape. Did it change my life? No, but it caused a shift.

I recommend.

[Scott Sanders · Rating 4 out of 5]

Less well known than he deserves to be, John Hay (1915-2011) wrote lyrical, ecologically-grounded celebrations of nature as viewed from his beloved Cape Cod. The Run, about the annual migration of alewives, the first of his books, is one of my favorites. But I also return with pleasure to The Bird of Light, about the soaring terns, and his more philosophical books, such as A Beginner's Faith in Things Unseen and In the Company of Light. An excellent introduction is The Way to the Salt Marsh: A John Hay Reader, edited by poet and essayist Christopher Merrill.