What do you think?
Rate this book
The View From Rat Lake
Brilliant, witty, perceptive essays about fly-fishing, the natural world, and life in general by the acknowledged master of fishing writers.
“In the world of fishing there are magic phrases that are guaranteed to summon the demon. Among them are: ‘remote trout lake,’ ‘fish up to 13 pounds,’ ‘the place the guides fish on their days off,’” writes John Gierach in this wonderful collection of thirteen essays inspired by a fishing trip to Rat Lake, a remote body of water in Montana. Once again John Gierach does what he does best—explain the peculiarities of the fishing life in a way that will amuse novices and seasoned fly fishers alike. The View from Rat Lake deftly examines man in nature and nature in man, the pleasures of fishing the high country, and the high and low comedy that occasionally overcomes even the best-planned fishing trip.
Some typically sage observations from The View from Rat Lake :
“One of the things we truly fish for [is] an occasion for self-congratulation.”
“In every catch-and-release fisherman’s past there is an old black frying pan.”
“We . . . believe that a 12-inch trout caught on a dry fly is four inches longer than a 12-inch trout caught on a nymph or streamer.”
“In the world of fishing there are magic phrases that are guaranteed to summon the demon. Among them are: ‘remote trout lake,’ ‘fish up to 13 pounds,’ ‘the place the guides fish on their days off,’” writes John Gierach in this wonderful collection of thirteen essays inspired by a fishing trip to Rat Lake, a remote body of water in Montana. Once again John Gierach does what he does best—explain the peculiarities of the fishing life in a way that will amuse novices and seasoned fly fishers alike. The View from Rat Lake deftly examines man in nature and nature in man, the pleasures of fishing the high country, and the high and low comedy that occasionally overcomes even the best-planned fishing trip.
Some typically sage observations from The View from Rat Lake :
“One of the things we truly fish for [is] an occasion for self-congratulation.”
“In every catch-and-release fisherman’s past there is an old black frying pan.”
“We . . . believe that a 12-inch trout caught on a dry fly is four inches longer than a 12-inch trout caught on a nymph or streamer.”
193 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 1988
37 people are currently reading
196 people want to read
About the author
John Gierach
40 books235 followersJohn Gierach was an American author and freelance writer who lived in Larimer County, Colorado.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
July 5, 2012
I had a déjà vu moment when I came to the panfishing story (The Music of the Spheres), because even though it is very well done, and I admire the sheer chutzpa of anyone trying to make a name as a fly fishing writer and writing about dry fly fishing coming out as a serious fisher of bass and – gulp – pumpkinseeds – I still got halfway through it and thought , for the second time, “I’m tired of this, maybe I’ll skip ahead to the next one…” I didn’t, and I was glad, because then I got the same reward as last time I stuck it out, with the lines from which the title is taken, about the music of the spheres influencing even the taking of the first bass popper of the day (think Shakespeare’s sparrow “There is special providence in the ffall of a sparrow …”). It is courageous, and poetic, and interesting in an everyday, everyman kind of way – a great example of John Gierach. We love to read it, because it is almost like going fishing yourself. There are descriptions of trout caught, and the strategies employed, with sidebars about the various patterns used past and present to match this particular hatch on this particular river, or detailed discussions about the authors evolution of thinking about bass poppers, or synthetic tying materials vs. traditional fur and feathers or cane vs. (sacrilegious non-cane type rod here). He talks like a purist, but because of the way he speaks about things synthetic, graphite or otherwise new-fangled, you know he has tried them, and is therefore no purist. These stories are comforting, and interesting, and they always involve fish. Good enough for a start.
I caught brookies in a small pond near my grandparent’s house when I was ten, tagging along with my older brother. We used fly rods, yes, but we also used eight foot long bamboo sticks with twine tied to the end supplied by my grandmother. What I chiefly remember about the new fly rod I got for my birthday (my brother had been busy lobbying my parents in what “I” wanted) was hanging the fly up behind me on the electrical wires that went to the little cabin above the pond, or in the grasses. But we caught trout, and while I’m sure we got skunked (I have been back to this “little pond” and it has been known to happen) I do not remember it. I remember the excitement of approaching the pond for the first time each year, and the anticipation of a fly landing on the surface, and the eagerness to see if this one was the monster 12” that we only ever caught once or twice a year. I do remember searching through the tall grass at the edge of where it was mown to for grasshoppers to impale on the hook as bait, so not all of our days could have gone smoothly. My brother had a patience that was probably four times longer than the average patience of an older brother.
I began my modern fly fishing career in the ocean. I wanted to buy a light tackle spining rod for bonito fishing. I ended up at Urban Anglers, which is a New York City fly shop, and I bought my first 8 weight. Several years later, I quit my job to move closer to the fishing I loved – Fall days on the Massachusetts coast searching for slashing bonito and false albacore, June nights on the salt flats casting to gulping stripers, an eye always on the ocean in case of roving runs of bluefish.
All that to explain why panfishing has never been my thing. If John Gierach could drive 200 miles and cast to rolling striped bass, I’m not sure he would have spent so much time philosophizing in his belly boat in the bass pond. Which isn’t necessarily a good thing, mind you, given the writing that has resulted from it.
There is something colloquial about Gierach, a what you see is what you get-ness that is at odds with the popular image of fly fishing. I think it is a large part of his charm – he writes about the snobbish areas of the sport, fully indulging the gearhead, technical aspects of it without losing his just another guy-ness. He is like some stodgy writers kid, who was supposed to follow in his father’s footsteps, but instead of journalism school and the editorial board of the local paper, he started reading Hunter S. Thompson and left school after the third semester and ended up in the hills fishing and writing.
The one story Gierach does give us that has much background in it, aside from the stuff about the titanic sufferings of Minnesota ice fishing, is the story about the fishing car. This is nothing fancy, what a character American brand of honesty. And even here, the scuffed surface is not whitewashed. There is something in his narrative voice that is both compelling and trustworthy. He is not afraid to tell us the things someone smaller might hide in the printed version, and he manages to turn them to his advantage. This section reminded me pleasantly of the stories of Robert Traver. There are glimpses of the shadow of this bonhomie, like when he admits he never cooks, that AK always has, and claims that to try to start now would be tantamount to disloyalty. It makes you wonder what AK might have to say on the subject. But this is his story, and while it is not, thank trout, a piece of magical realism, like so many of the overblown fishing-porn magazine articles you see, it is not literary fiction either, where everyone has to nurse a hidden grudge, and use it to brain each other when they can. This is good, clean, starry eyed I wish I were fishing stuff. Gonzo fishing journalism. A selection of choice bits taken meanly, but in good spirit out of context:
There are the wise, cynical, writerly takes on the world that are like bacon bits in a good salad:
“(It’s a little known fact that the barometer was actually invented by a fisherman. Its original purpose was not to measure atmospheric pressure, but to provide scientific-sounding excuses for not catching fish.)”
And, of course, the humor; from The Purist, about the snobbery and satisfaction of the sport, comes this line:
“Purity by nostalgia is an interesting idea, but the logic of it is inescapable. To do it right, you’d have to live naked in a cave, hit your trout on the head with rocks, and eat them raw. But, so as not to violate another essential element of the fly fishing tradition, the rocks would have to be quarried in England, and cost $300 each.”
I found this so amusing that I annoyed my wife by laughing in bed. There were probably twenty such moments in The View From Rat Lake, not all quite so funny as to disturb the domestic peace.
And the romantic interest, in a book about a pastime whose inherent romance doesn’t usually allow for any more – the confession. From Home Water:
“I was married for a while out here – to the second and, perhaps, last wife of my career – but it didn’t last long …. there was the endless fishing, and all the talk about fishing. I thought it was great, she thought it was shitty – boring – corny. As Norman McClean might have said, a river ran through all this. It seemed to tell me, in a dozen subtle ways per day, that you can’t have two things at once if those two things cancel each other out and, further, that you should probably choose the one that has never gone out of its way to screw you around.”
Not quite charming, but honest. The kind of thing a friend might confess over a campfire. It makes for pleasant reading sitting by the woodstove, that’s for sure.
I caught brookies in a small pond near my grandparent’s house when I was ten, tagging along with my older brother. We used fly rods, yes, but we also used eight foot long bamboo sticks with twine tied to the end supplied by my grandmother. What I chiefly remember about the new fly rod I got for my birthday (my brother had been busy lobbying my parents in what “I” wanted) was hanging the fly up behind me on the electrical wires that went to the little cabin above the pond, or in the grasses. But we caught trout, and while I’m sure we got skunked (I have been back to this “little pond” and it has been known to happen) I do not remember it. I remember the excitement of approaching the pond for the first time each year, and the anticipation of a fly landing on the surface, and the eagerness to see if this one was the monster 12” that we only ever caught once or twice a year. I do remember searching through the tall grass at the edge of where it was mown to for grasshoppers to impale on the hook as bait, so not all of our days could have gone smoothly. My brother had a patience that was probably four times longer than the average patience of an older brother.
I began my modern fly fishing career in the ocean. I wanted to buy a light tackle spining rod for bonito fishing. I ended up at Urban Anglers, which is a New York City fly shop, and I bought my first 8 weight. Several years later, I quit my job to move closer to the fishing I loved – Fall days on the Massachusetts coast searching for slashing bonito and false albacore, June nights on the salt flats casting to gulping stripers, an eye always on the ocean in case of roving runs of bluefish.
All that to explain why panfishing has never been my thing. If John Gierach could drive 200 miles and cast to rolling striped bass, I’m not sure he would have spent so much time philosophizing in his belly boat in the bass pond. Which isn’t necessarily a good thing, mind you, given the writing that has resulted from it.
There is something colloquial about Gierach, a what you see is what you get-ness that is at odds with the popular image of fly fishing. I think it is a large part of his charm – he writes about the snobbish areas of the sport, fully indulging the gearhead, technical aspects of it without losing his just another guy-ness. He is like some stodgy writers kid, who was supposed to follow in his father’s footsteps, but instead of journalism school and the editorial board of the local paper, he started reading Hunter S. Thompson and left school after the third semester and ended up in the hills fishing and writing.
The one story Gierach does give us that has much background in it, aside from the stuff about the titanic sufferings of Minnesota ice fishing, is the story about the fishing car. This is nothing fancy, what a character American brand of honesty. And even here, the scuffed surface is not whitewashed. There is something in his narrative voice that is both compelling and trustworthy. He is not afraid to tell us the things someone smaller might hide in the printed version, and he manages to turn them to his advantage. This section reminded me pleasantly of the stories of Robert Traver. There are glimpses of the shadow of this bonhomie, like when he admits he never cooks, that AK always has, and claims that to try to start now would be tantamount to disloyalty. It makes you wonder what AK might have to say on the subject. But this is his story, and while it is not, thank trout, a piece of magical realism, like so many of the overblown fishing-porn magazine articles you see, it is not literary fiction either, where everyone has to nurse a hidden grudge, and use it to brain each other when they can. This is good, clean, starry eyed I wish I were fishing stuff. Gonzo fishing journalism. A selection of choice bits taken meanly, but in good spirit out of context:
There are the wise, cynical, writerly takes on the world that are like bacon bits in a good salad:
“(It’s a little known fact that the barometer was actually invented by a fisherman. Its original purpose was not to measure atmospheric pressure, but to provide scientific-sounding excuses for not catching fish.)”
And, of course, the humor; from The Purist, about the snobbery and satisfaction of the sport, comes this line:
“Purity by nostalgia is an interesting idea, but the logic of it is inescapable. To do it right, you’d have to live naked in a cave, hit your trout on the head with rocks, and eat them raw. But, so as not to violate another essential element of the fly fishing tradition, the rocks would have to be quarried in England, and cost $300 each.”
I found this so amusing that I annoyed my wife by laughing in bed. There were probably twenty such moments in The View From Rat Lake, not all quite so funny as to disturb the domestic peace.
And the romantic interest, in a book about a pastime whose inherent romance doesn’t usually allow for any more – the confession. From Home Water:
“I was married for a while out here – to the second and, perhaps, last wife of my career – but it didn’t last long …. there was the endless fishing, and all the talk about fishing. I thought it was great, she thought it was shitty – boring – corny. As Norman McClean might have said, a river ran through all this. It seemed to tell me, in a dozen subtle ways per day, that you can’t have two things at once if those two things cancel each other out and, further, that you should probably choose the one that has never gone out of its way to screw you around.”
Not quite charming, but honest. The kind of thing a friend might confess over a campfire. It makes for pleasant reading sitting by the woodstove, that’s for sure.
July 27, 2024
This book encompasses all the ins and outs of traditional fly-fishing. The author goes into great detail about the type of flies trout like and how they determined what he and his fishing partner decided to use by observing what the fish were biting. The two fishing buddies have a long friendship where they visited parts of the Northwest, into Canada and west of Minnesota. In thirty years of fly-fishing for trout, together they fished all the well-known rivers, streams, creeks, and ponds. They witnessed the surge of popularity of fly-fishing as well.
I really liked how the author wrote this book as it was interesting, entertaining in parts, sad at the loss of riverways because of damning and the rise in popularity of fly-fishing. Reading this book also reminded me of my Dad as he use to make his own flies as well and went fly-fishing with his father. I always enjoyed going fishing with my Dad.
I really liked how the author wrote this book as it was interesting, entertaining in parts, sad at the loss of riverways because of damning and the rise in popularity of fly-fishing. Reading this book also reminded me of my Dad as he use to make his own flies as well and went fly-fishing with his father. I always enjoyed going fishing with my Dad.
January 3, 2026
John Gierach doesn’t just write about fly fishing and catching trophy trout (he does do that as well!), he reveals truth about life. The thirteen essays are all stand alone meanderings that cover such topics as camping, road trips, bamboo, and bugs. Gierach is required wintertime reading.
May 7, 2019
Almost as good as going fishing.
October 25, 2019
Gierach continues to place me in the middle of rivers and woods and road trips.
March 13, 2022
One of Gierach’s funnier books.
July 29, 2012
Another humorous gem from the master of understatement,set in the tranquillity of Montana
April 22, 2017
Made me want to fish!
Good read
This is the kind of book that'd help non readers like many of my students want to read!
Good read
This is the kind of book that'd help non readers like many of my students want to read!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews