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At the Loch of the Green Corrie
I should like you to fish for me at the Loch of the Green Corrie,' MacCaig commanded months before his death. 'Go to Lochinver and ask for a man named Norman MacAskill - if he likes you he may tell you where it is. If you catch a fish, I shall be delighted. If you fail, then looking down from a place in which I do not believe, I shall be most amused.' The quest sounds simple and irresistible, but the loch is as demanding as it is beautiful. In the course of days of outdoor living, meetings, and fishing with friends in the remote hill lochs of far North-West Scotland, the search broadens. The waters of the Green Corrie finally reflect personal memoir, joy and loss, poetry, geology, land ownership in the Highlands, the ambiguous roles of whisky, love and friendship. At the Loch of the Green Corrie is a richly atmospheric narrative, a celebration of losing and recovering oneself in a unique landscape, the consideration of a particular culture, and a homage to a remarkable poet and his world.
324 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 2010
28 people are currently reading
513 people want to read
About the author
Andrew Greig
56 books85 followersAndrew Greig is a Scottish writer who grew up in Anstruther, Fife. He studied philosophy at the University of Edinburgh and is a former Glasgow University Writing Fellow and Scottish Arts Council Scottish/Canadian Exchange Fellow. He lives in Orkney and Edinburgh and is married to author Lesley Glaister.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 76 reviews
May 6, 2010
Fishing here is not the subject matter. It’s a metaphor to cast into memory and retrieve what comes up. Like those trout flies that look nothing like flies but attract the fish, as if they too perceive the world through metaphors. Certainly, reality, so invoked in this book, so almost tactile, is always shimmering too, like clouds and shadows, reflections on water, shifting colours and unknown depths. Fishing as metaphor also evokes chance, skill, success and failure, and time: if you cannot wait fruitlessly through shifting moods, and without catching anything, you are not a true angler.
I very much like Greig’s work: his climbing books, his novels and his poetry. He and two old friends, brothers, found the Loch of the Green Corrie following Greig’s final meeting with his friend, the great poet Norman MacCaig who was 86 at the time. He asked Greig to travel to Lochinver, that most loved village of MacCaig up in the far northwest, and there ask for Norman MacAskill who may, “if he likes you” tell you where the loch was to be found. MacCaig, knowing his own death was imminent said that if Greig caught a fish there he would look down from that place in which he did not believe and smile.
Yet, writing the book and reflecting, years later, Greig realises that MacCaig’s request was not in fact the theme of the book but its occasion. And although it is full of beautiful and tender anecdotes and imagery around MacCaig, and one superb section which discusses his poetry, , At the Loch of the Green Corrie is essentially a personal memoir, a deeply honest and potent autobiographical account that is structured perfectly to embed itself in the geology, the history and community of the Assynt landscape. Memory is the key here, and his refractions of the deep time of rock’s emergence from fire, of the deep space of the cosmos into which space he feels himself falling one star-saturated night provide a startling perspective upon human activity. His character pictures are wonderfully humane, his understanding of historical injustice straightforwardly angry. Always pondering the far and the close, the inner and the outer, most of all his tender immanence of those whom he knows and has known are one stratum of that powerful word we know as Love.
There is, for me, a painfully recognisable coming to terms with frailty, death, the unhappy times in life. Much here recounts waste, life cut short, the presence of Death at every step. Although Greig does not evoke Pascal’s “thinking reed” – that fragile, almost negligible thing but with a mind that can take on the whole universe – it came to mind while I was reading. A passage such as this gives an example”
As I stand on a new rock and work my line out, I am casting alongside it, a internal counterpart, sent out for its own ghostly catch. Which is where we live, balancing precariously on this rock, at the intersection of the world outside and the one within.
Surely, throughout the book too, is an act of love quite woven into the text, what Greig the poet has learned, especially from MacCaig but all who have influenced him, so:
Whether clambering over diorite dyke swarms, passing a hand over my lover’s face or the chill strata on Knockan Crag, driving through empty glens, considering the metamorphoses of poetry, the quests are aspects of the one quest: to find the faultlines – or if you prefer something more positive-sounding, the lines of thrust – that have brought us to where we are.
An where we are is “tracing ways that we take the world and remodel it within. Call it metaphor or memory, opinion or mind-spin, it remains the incorrigible mystery we call our life.”
What can’t be remotely conveyed in this short review but needs pointing out is that At the Loch of the Green Corrie is a celebration of friendship and love. I fear I have skimmed off only its more philosophical surface (Greig is a Philosophy graduate, and a self-affirmed East Coast rationalist), and left unspoken the richness of the writing, the humour and joy, the affirmation of life. Perhaps we are all fishers, and it’s only in our own dedication to casting and retrieving that we’ll share the vision:
Between the … inner and outer worlds, lies a chasm. And across that are slung the slender, dizzying bridges of empathy, metaphor, curiosity, art, intellect and the potency that bundles together all these – love.
I very much like Greig’s work: his climbing books, his novels and his poetry. He and two old friends, brothers, found the Loch of the Green Corrie following Greig’s final meeting with his friend, the great poet Norman MacCaig who was 86 at the time. He asked Greig to travel to Lochinver, that most loved village of MacCaig up in the far northwest, and there ask for Norman MacAskill who may, “if he likes you” tell you where the loch was to be found. MacCaig, knowing his own death was imminent said that if Greig caught a fish there he would look down from that place in which he did not believe and smile.
Yet, writing the book and reflecting, years later, Greig realises that MacCaig’s request was not in fact the theme of the book but its occasion. And although it is full of beautiful and tender anecdotes and imagery around MacCaig, and one superb section which discusses his poetry, , At the Loch of the Green Corrie is essentially a personal memoir, a deeply honest and potent autobiographical account that is structured perfectly to embed itself in the geology, the history and community of the Assynt landscape. Memory is the key here, and his refractions of the deep time of rock’s emergence from fire, of the deep space of the cosmos into which space he feels himself falling one star-saturated night provide a startling perspective upon human activity. His character pictures are wonderfully humane, his understanding of historical injustice straightforwardly angry. Always pondering the far and the close, the inner and the outer, most of all his tender immanence of those whom he knows and has known are one stratum of that powerful word we know as Love.
There is, for me, a painfully recognisable coming to terms with frailty, death, the unhappy times in life. Much here recounts waste, life cut short, the presence of Death at every step. Although Greig does not evoke Pascal’s “thinking reed” – that fragile, almost negligible thing but with a mind that can take on the whole universe – it came to mind while I was reading. A passage such as this gives an example”
As I stand on a new rock and work my line out, I am casting alongside it, a internal counterpart, sent out for its own ghostly catch. Which is where we live, balancing precariously on this rock, at the intersection of the world outside and the one within.
Surely, throughout the book too, is an act of love quite woven into the text, what Greig the poet has learned, especially from MacCaig but all who have influenced him, so:
Whether clambering over diorite dyke swarms, passing a hand over my lover’s face or the chill strata on Knockan Crag, driving through empty glens, considering the metamorphoses of poetry, the quests are aspects of the one quest: to find the faultlines – or if you prefer something more positive-sounding, the lines of thrust – that have brought us to where we are.
An where we are is “tracing ways that we take the world and remodel it within. Call it metaphor or memory, opinion or mind-spin, it remains the incorrigible mystery we call our life.”
What can’t be remotely conveyed in this short review but needs pointing out is that At the Loch of the Green Corrie is a celebration of friendship and love. I fear I have skimmed off only its more philosophical surface (Greig is a Philosophy graduate, and a self-affirmed East Coast rationalist), and left unspoken the richness of the writing, the humour and joy, the affirmation of life. Perhaps we are all fishers, and it’s only in our own dedication to casting and retrieving that we’ll share the vision:
Between the … inner and outer worlds, lies a chasm. And across that are slung the slender, dizzying bridges of empathy, metaphor, curiosity, art, intellect and the potency that bundles together all these – love.
February 7, 2018
A luminous, poetic reflective book which is impossible to categorise. Partly a tribute to Greig's friend and mentor, the late poet Norman MacCaig and the people and landscape of Assynt in the North West Highlands that MacCaig loved, it is also a memoir and reflection on life, love, friendship, poetry, whisky and fishing. Highly recommended.
March 8, 2018
Timor mortis conturbat me, part 2...
At his last meeting with renowned Scottish poet Norman MacCaig, MacCaig laid a charge on Andrew Greig to make a journey after MacCaig's death to his beloved Assynt in the north west of Scotland, and there to fish in the Loch of the Green Corrie. This is the story of that trip, mixed with Greig's memories of and musings on MacCaig and his own life.
I've said this before, but my rating system is not an indicator of quality but simply of my enjoyment or otherwise of a particular book. In terms of quality, this book deserves more and plenty of people have loved or will love it. So I've gone with 3 stars even though I didn't enjoy it at all.
I often recycle the titles I use for reviews, and I knew what the title for this one would be before I was more than a few chapters in: Timor mortis conturbat me – the fear of death confounds me. I also knew I had used the title before, so checked to see when. Turns out it was when I reviewed the only other book of Greig's that I have read, In Another Light.
Greig writes of MacCaig's declining years, of the loss of his mountaineering friend Malcolm Duff, of his own near miss when he suffered from a cyst in his brain, of his father's death. He tells us of his breakdown following a failed relationship, when he ended up in a psychiatric hospital after attempting suicide. I found the whole thing deeply depressing.
Most people of my age have lost people we loved and recognise that we're closer to death than birth, and we all deal with it differently. Greig writes it out of his system and does so very well. Many people read about it and find comfort and strength from the recognition of common experience. I know already how grief feels and that it passes or lessens in time, and find no benefit or comfort in reflecting endlessly on my own past losses or anyone else's. Timor mortis has never confounded me particularly – I'm more of an eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we may die type. So Greig and I are simply not a good match. And that's not a criticism of either of us.
I abandoned this one at 30%, and won't be attempting to read any more of his books. But I'm still happy to recommend them to the many people who find some kind of comfort or insight in having the experience of mortality and loss reflected back to them.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
At his last meeting with renowned Scottish poet Norman MacCaig, MacCaig laid a charge on Andrew Greig to make a journey after MacCaig's death to his beloved Assynt in the north west of Scotland, and there to fish in the Loch of the Green Corrie. This is the story of that trip, mixed with Greig's memories of and musings on MacCaig and his own life.
I've said this before, but my rating system is not an indicator of quality but simply of my enjoyment or otherwise of a particular book. In terms of quality, this book deserves more and plenty of people have loved or will love it. So I've gone with 3 stars even though I didn't enjoy it at all.
I often recycle the titles I use for reviews, and I knew what the title for this one would be before I was more than a few chapters in: Timor mortis conturbat me – the fear of death confounds me. I also knew I had used the title before, so checked to see when. Turns out it was when I reviewed the only other book of Greig's that I have read, In Another Light.
Greig writes of MacCaig's declining years, of the loss of his mountaineering friend Malcolm Duff, of his own near miss when he suffered from a cyst in his brain, of his father's death. He tells us of his breakdown following a failed relationship, when he ended up in a psychiatric hospital after attempting suicide. I found the whole thing deeply depressing.
Most people of my age have lost people we loved and recognise that we're closer to death than birth, and we all deal with it differently. Greig writes it out of his system and does so very well. Many people read about it and find comfort and strength from the recognition of common experience. I know already how grief feels and that it passes or lessens in time, and find no benefit or comfort in reflecting endlessly on my own past losses or anyone else's. Timor mortis has never confounded me particularly – I'm more of an eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we may die type. So Greig and I are simply not a good match. And that's not a criticism of either of us.
I abandoned this one at 30%, and won't be attempting to read any more of his books. But I'm still happy to recommend them to the many people who find some kind of comfort or insight in having the experience of mortality and loss reflected back to them.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
June 18, 2013
I have spent enough time in the western islands of Scotland to recognise with great fondness the landscape that Andrew Greig describes in this book. The first impact the book has had on me therefore is to inspire me to return to the wilds of western Scotland.
I am also grateful for the introduction the poetry of Norman MacCaig. There are some wonderful excerpts of his landscape poetry in here, and I went and dipped in to his Collected Poems. His writing is clear, unpretentious, confident in its intelligence and tone.
This is a book about much more than landscape or fishing - these are but hooks to line up a poet's ruminations on what it is to be alive. The book is a series of beautifully written reflections on memory, mortality, and metaphor. Not only are there countless stunning metaphors in the themes and writing, but the use of metaphor as a means of interacting with the world is a theme in its own right. Indeed the book is finally about the living challenge of how we interpret between subjective reality and the external world. Poetry is one form of mediation between the two,and metaphor one of its devices. But in fact all of our thought, art, memory, relationships, past, future, survival are but unverifiable versions of unreality. To appreciate and accept this is not nihilistic, but somehow liberating in its honesty and openness.
It is striking how the rugged beauty of the expansive landscapes of western Scotland provokes these philosophical reflections on the place of an individual human being in the greater world. Our tiny figures are seen in the contexts of nature and time, the latter literally made large by the evidence of geological time.
I related to Greig's interest in language and poetry, in landscape, in the importance of love between friends and lovers as enduring and sustaining over a lifetime, in the brevity of life and its lack of overall intent and meaning, yet in the celebration and remembering of the brilliant ordinary highlights of our own life. It is a challenge to live life more fully, or at least to appreciate it: "when I am dead, I will love this ... this is what the dead envy us, the sweetness at the heart of physical existence...Pick any ordinary moment ... - you will love it when you're dead, so you can love it now."
I am also grateful for the introduction the poetry of Norman MacCaig. There are some wonderful excerpts of his landscape poetry in here, and I went and dipped in to his Collected Poems. His writing is clear, unpretentious, confident in its intelligence and tone.
This is a book about much more than landscape or fishing - these are but hooks to line up a poet's ruminations on what it is to be alive. The book is a series of beautifully written reflections on memory, mortality, and metaphor. Not only are there countless stunning metaphors in the themes and writing, but the use of metaphor as a means of interacting with the world is a theme in its own right. Indeed the book is finally about the living challenge of how we interpret between subjective reality and the external world. Poetry is one form of mediation between the two,and metaphor one of its devices. But in fact all of our thought, art, memory, relationships, past, future, survival are but unverifiable versions of unreality. To appreciate and accept this is not nihilistic, but somehow liberating in its honesty and openness.
It is striking how the rugged beauty of the expansive landscapes of western Scotland provokes these philosophical reflections on the place of an individual human being in the greater world. Our tiny figures are seen in the contexts of nature and time, the latter literally made large by the evidence of geological time.
I related to Greig's interest in language and poetry, in landscape, in the importance of love between friends and lovers as enduring and sustaining over a lifetime, in the brevity of life and its lack of overall intent and meaning, yet in the celebration and remembering of the brilliant ordinary highlights of our own life. It is a challenge to live life more fully, or at least to appreciate it: "when I am dead, I will love this ... this is what the dead envy us, the sweetness at the heart of physical existence...Pick any ordinary moment ... - you will love it when you're dead, so you can love it now."
April 3, 2020
Andrew Greig has written an elegiac account of his relationship with Norman McCaig, one of Scotland’s most important poets of the C20th and one who is not very well-known outside his own country, and possibly not as well-known as he should be in his own country. Norman McCaig is the poet of Assynt, which is north of Ullapool on the west coast of Scotland. To describe it as remote is like saying that hell is hot. It would be off the beaten track if there was actually a track.
At their last meeting, before McCaig died, he asked Andrew Greig to go fishing for him in the Loch of the Green Corrie. McCaig did not make it easy because the Loch of the Green Corrie is not its real name. It is a translation from the Gaelic. The loch is remote even by Assynt standards, and McCaig does not make it easy. He tells Andrew Greig to seek out a man called McAllister who may tell him where the loch is, if he likes him. Greig does not set off immediately. He has to have a near-death experience, and a time in hospital, before he decides to set off with two friends to find the loch and to go fishing for trout there.
What follows is an extraordinary description of Assynt, interspersed with poems by Norman McCaig about the area. There is a helpful map that helps the reader to get to grips with the geography of the area, and there is a glossary of Gaelic names and how to pronounce them. This latter is helpful, but ultimately does not matter unless someone is actually going to hear you attempt the pronunciation. I was able to work out that the Loch of the Green Corrie is really called Loch a Choire Ghuirm, but I haven’t got a clue about how to pronounce it.
Andrew Greig, before his illness, was a climber in the Himalayas and was therefore used to the hardships of walking in difficult terrain. This is important because, although he does not make it sound easy, the unskilled may be tempted to set out on the walk, and it may be necessary to call out the Mountain Rescue. Nan Shepherd would not be amused, and nor would Andrew Greig.
It is much easier to read the book and to enjoy the scenery at one remove. It is also important to remember that this was not always an empty country. The population was forcibly removed by the orders of the Duchess of Sutherland, to be replaced by the much more profitable deer. Across Assynt, you will see the ruins of cottages. Greig tells us about the successful efforts of the Assynt Crofters’ Association in buying back the land from the estate of Lord Vestey, which encouraged others throughout the Highlands and Islands to do the same. This is not an easy history.
What it is, is simple. It is a book imbued with the love of the place. It is full of understanding for what has happened to the land and its people. It is inspired by the poetry of Norman McCaig.
It is simply extraordinary and you should read it.
At their last meeting, before McCaig died, he asked Andrew Greig to go fishing for him in the Loch of the Green Corrie. McCaig did not make it easy because the Loch of the Green Corrie is not its real name. It is a translation from the Gaelic. The loch is remote even by Assynt standards, and McCaig does not make it easy. He tells Andrew Greig to seek out a man called McAllister who may tell him where the loch is, if he likes him. Greig does not set off immediately. He has to have a near-death experience, and a time in hospital, before he decides to set off with two friends to find the loch and to go fishing for trout there.
What follows is an extraordinary description of Assynt, interspersed with poems by Norman McCaig about the area. There is a helpful map that helps the reader to get to grips with the geography of the area, and there is a glossary of Gaelic names and how to pronounce them. This latter is helpful, but ultimately does not matter unless someone is actually going to hear you attempt the pronunciation. I was able to work out that the Loch of the Green Corrie is really called Loch a Choire Ghuirm, but I haven’t got a clue about how to pronounce it.
Andrew Greig, before his illness, was a climber in the Himalayas and was therefore used to the hardships of walking in difficult terrain. This is important because, although he does not make it sound easy, the unskilled may be tempted to set out on the walk, and it may be necessary to call out the Mountain Rescue. Nan Shepherd would not be amused, and nor would Andrew Greig.
It is much easier to read the book and to enjoy the scenery at one remove. It is also important to remember that this was not always an empty country. The population was forcibly removed by the orders of the Duchess of Sutherland, to be replaced by the much more profitable deer. Across Assynt, you will see the ruins of cottages. Greig tells us about the successful efforts of the Assynt Crofters’ Association in buying back the land from the estate of Lord Vestey, which encouraged others throughout the Highlands and Islands to do the same. This is not an easy history.
What it is, is simple. It is a book imbued with the love of the place. It is full of understanding for what has happened to the land and its people. It is inspired by the poetry of Norman McCaig.
It is simply extraordinary and you should read it.
July 24, 2023
This is a very odd book that pulls you in and out of the past into another past and back again. Andrew Greig knew the great Scottish poets of the recent past and in this novel he is on a quest from Norman MacCraig, to visit the Loch of the Green Corrie in Scotland and to catch a fish. The book is not only about this but mostly about people and the connections we make with them, their flaws and their way of influencing the world around them (be it literature or whatever). While I enjoyed large parts of the book, the ending felt cobbled together, too rushed, too much information too fast. I also did not really enjoyed that this is a world of men (supposedly) and women barely play a role. Fascinating yet it also leaves something to be desired. 3.5-4 stars
January 18, 2012
Andrew Greig's work resists categorization. It's part memoir, part travel writing, part history book (Scotland), philosophy, and geology journal, all wrapped into one. That may sound confusing, but it is, in fact, unique and delightful. This is a beautiful book inside and out (kudos to whomever designed the jacket.) I also acquired a copy of the selected poems of Norman MacCaig (The Many Days) to go with this novel, and I've been reading the two books side by side. I love the poetry.
In the final chapter the story jumps straight out of the pages into your living room or perhaps bed room, depending on the time of day. The author says that it's time to close the book, we all have sleep to catch. I found myself smiling, as it was one in the morning and I was still wide awake and reading Green Corrie while browsing some of MacCaig's poems. I was especially moved by Greig's description of the inner and outer worlds and the chasm in between, and his personal realizations -- how he learns to make an effort to put pain and death and loss to use in his life, to cherish the present moment. There's something special about this book. Highly recommended.
In the final chapter the story jumps straight out of the pages into your living room or perhaps bed room, depending on the time of day. The author says that it's time to close the book, we all have sleep to catch. I found myself smiling, as it was one in the morning and I was still wide awake and reading Green Corrie while browsing some of MacCaig's poems. I was especially moved by Greig's description of the inner and outer worlds and the chasm in between, and his personal realizations -- how he learns to make an effort to put pain and death and loss to use in his life, to cherish the present moment. There's something special about this book. Highly recommended.
March 3, 2014
3.5
A strange mixture of a book - the poet Norman MacCaig, fly fishing, geology, travel etc - beautifully written although maybe a little too self indulgent in places.
I had never heard of MacCaig, have no interest in any sort of fishing, and I can take or leave geology but the book was always interesting.
Greig starts off quite reticently, hinting at past troubles and illnesses, but it isn't until you get quite a way into the book that you get fuller explanations (brain injury, a failed marriage, a breakdown). It's like meeting a stranger and after time they open up and reveal some of themselves to you. Clearly a lot remains unsaid.
I would love Grieg to write about fellow Scot Robert Louis Stevenson, he would do a great job! Both restless and wandering, deep thinkers with the pull of Scotland always there, managing illness and sometimes difficult personal lives.
A strange mixture of a book - the poet Norman MacCaig, fly fishing, geology, travel etc - beautifully written although maybe a little too self indulgent in places.
I had never heard of MacCaig, have no interest in any sort of fishing, and I can take or leave geology but the book was always interesting.
Greig starts off quite reticently, hinting at past troubles and illnesses, but it isn't until you get quite a way into the book that you get fuller explanations (brain injury, a failed marriage, a breakdown). It's like meeting a stranger and after time they open up and reveal some of themselves to you. Clearly a lot remains unsaid.
I would love Grieg to write about fellow Scot Robert Louis Stevenson, he would do a great job! Both restless and wandering, deep thinkers with the pull of Scotland always there, managing illness and sometimes difficult personal lives.
September 30, 2018
A request that reads like a poem leads to a journey to the Scottish highlands. A wonderful tale of language, nature, friendship and beauty. Though it is prose, the poetry shines through 'he stalks up those stairs like a heron'. 'Sometimes the more you know, the less you see. What you encounter is your knowledge, not the thing itself.' It's about leading the good life, looking back and making choices. He concludes 'the measure of a person's life is how many hostages to fortune he or she is prepared to take on.'
December 11, 2010
The opening chapter is worryingly grandiose; the prose is making me wince. I hope the whole of Greig's book isn't tainted in this way. I know Greig can write, but at the moment he appears to be in love less with the message than the medium. Is this what happens to people who achieve the label 'literary' - this tendency to weighty rhetoric? Ponderous words, but nothing to say. Kathleen Jamie's Findings suffers from the same tendency.
July 28, 2011
Quirky, mostly beautiful ramble through landscape and geology, poetry and poets, fishing and friendship. One of the best books about the poetic life and vision I've read. In this case, the homage is to the Scottish poet Norman McCaig, by another poet (or rock musician turned poet turned mountaineer and golfer turned fiction and nonfiction writer), Andrew Greig.
August 11, 2023
I really don’t think I would have ploughed on with this book if it wasn’t a book club read, don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the descriptions of the landscapes and the camping having experienced both myself but I found the wandering timeline and (sometimes random) characters difficult to keep a grasp of.
December 20, 2014
I defy you to read this and then not want to go and try to find the loch.
This is an area of Scotland I know reasonably well, but of course, not the loch. Not yet anyway.
This is a truly magical book.
This is an area of Scotland I know reasonably well, but of course, not the loch. Not yet anyway.
This is a truly magical book.
March 30, 2020
Art is not a pleasant frivolity, a decoration daubed over the “real world“, but as real as it gets.
This is an enjoyable, but somewhat disjointed, ?travelogue ?memoir ?love letter. I enjoyed some of the philosophical commentary, for example, his commentary about our present experience and deep time, with the bulk of our lives muddled in the in-between. I also enjoyed learning more about geology, the Scottish enlightenment and a different take on Culloden. Other digressions were less comprehensible to fit the narrative.
On the downside, he seemed at times to be quite immature and unsure of himself with a sense of inadequacy that seemed to really needle him, especially as it pertains to family. Whether it was Sorely MacLean asking for “your people” or Peter suggesting that the value of a man is measured by his family. The book was also disjointed and I think it would have been better if it ended after “day four“. I’m really not sure what the remainder was, almost a justification for the initial pursuit and validation now that he is married. While mostly interesting, it appeared tacked-on and in my view, did not add very much to Norman MacCaig or his love of the Assynt. It would have worked better as a 20 page epilogue, rather than an additional 80 pages of peripheral reminiscences.
As for the writing, the first chapter seemed to be some of his best writing with abstract concepts clearly expressed. Some of metaphors were truly wonderful, while other were a bit strained, forced and occasionally cringe worthy (the numerous analogies between casting lines and stringing words). And lastly, especially as I found myself truly enjoying much of Norman MacCaig’s poetry, it seems unfortunate, even as an homage, to conclude the book with his own poem, which to my ears, is inferior.
All in all, a very enjoyable book, which I’ll criticize for droning on a bit when it seems to lose itself, being almost apologetic for it’s writing and when the writing didn’t seem to be flowing, forcing either inept metaphors rather than just plain speaking or sophomoric philosophizing making me think of bong water soaked carpets in freshman dorms (paraphrasing here: the plane of existence and poetry being the spot where the mountain and it’s reflected image, both real, meet in line). I also didn’t see the point of the long discussions of AK. True, he seem to be the keystone of MacCaig’s love of the Assynt and the most important person in his life, so it’s relevant. But it also seemed in some poor way to justify the author’s own imbalanced love affair with the poet himself.
Perhaps I’m being uncharitable. Perhaps in him I see the aspects of myself that I don’t care for. I don’t have a strong family and try to connect myself to people that I admire, and try to distill meaning and significance into my own life through their presence, their solidity - even though this may only be a pale reflection or long shadow. But I think that gap is where art, and the lover of the arts, exists. This yearning. The gap between the inner life and outer world that Grieg discusses.
Ending on a positive impression. I quite liked, in my own mind - the experience of being made very aware of one’s own presence and veracity of being alive in the presence of nature - even as it seems that one’s own body dissolves of all substance except for one’s senses - He writes, “it’s what used to happen when the needle came down on the record empty opening grooves, the sound of presence.”
This is an enjoyable, but somewhat disjointed, ?travelogue ?memoir ?love letter. I enjoyed some of the philosophical commentary, for example, his commentary about our present experience and deep time, with the bulk of our lives muddled in the in-between. I also enjoyed learning more about geology, the Scottish enlightenment and a different take on Culloden. Other digressions were less comprehensible to fit the narrative.
On the downside, he seemed at times to be quite immature and unsure of himself with a sense of inadequacy that seemed to really needle him, especially as it pertains to family. Whether it was Sorely MacLean asking for “your people” or Peter suggesting that the value of a man is measured by his family. The book was also disjointed and I think it would have been better if it ended after “day four“. I’m really not sure what the remainder was, almost a justification for the initial pursuit and validation now that he is married. While mostly interesting, it appeared tacked-on and in my view, did not add very much to Norman MacCaig or his love of the Assynt. It would have worked better as a 20 page epilogue, rather than an additional 80 pages of peripheral reminiscences.
As for the writing, the first chapter seemed to be some of his best writing with abstract concepts clearly expressed. Some of metaphors were truly wonderful, while other were a bit strained, forced and occasionally cringe worthy (the numerous analogies between casting lines and stringing words). And lastly, especially as I found myself truly enjoying much of Norman MacCaig’s poetry, it seems unfortunate, even as an homage, to conclude the book with his own poem, which to my ears, is inferior.
All in all, a very enjoyable book, which I’ll criticize for droning on a bit when it seems to lose itself, being almost apologetic for it’s writing and when the writing didn’t seem to be flowing, forcing either inept metaphors rather than just plain speaking or sophomoric philosophizing making me think of bong water soaked carpets in freshman dorms (paraphrasing here: the plane of existence and poetry being the spot where the mountain and it’s reflected image, both real, meet in line). I also didn’t see the point of the long discussions of AK. True, he seem to be the keystone of MacCaig’s love of the Assynt and the most important person in his life, so it’s relevant. But it also seemed in some poor way to justify the author’s own imbalanced love affair with the poet himself.
Perhaps I’m being uncharitable. Perhaps in him I see the aspects of myself that I don’t care for. I don’t have a strong family and try to connect myself to people that I admire, and try to distill meaning and significance into my own life through their presence, their solidity - even though this may only be a pale reflection or long shadow. But I think that gap is where art, and the lover of the arts, exists. This yearning. The gap between the inner life and outer world that Grieg discusses.
Ending on a positive impression. I quite liked, in my own mind - the experience of being made very aware of one’s own presence and veracity of being alive in the presence of nature - even as it seems that one’s own body dissolves of all substance except for one’s senses - He writes, “it’s what used to happen when the needle came down on the record empty opening grooves, the sound of presence.”
June 23, 2022
This non-fiction book is Grieg’s tribute to Norman MacCaig, one of that generation of Scottish poets which included Christopher Murray Grieve (Hugh McDiarmid,) Sidney Goodsir Smith, Sorley MacLean and Edwin Morgan, to whom Greig as an aspiring poet himself looked up. Not long before MacCaig’s death he laid on Greig a request that he catch for him a fish at the loch of the green corrie (which isn’t the loch’s real name) in MacCaig’s beloved Assynt in the western Highlands. But it is much more than a mere tribute. It is an appreciation of MacCaig’s poetry, a voyage into Greig’s past and present relationhips, and into the Deep Time which geologist James Hutton divined must be the case from his studies of the native rocks of that area and the changes which had been wrought on them, a threnody to the landscape of Assynt (and Scotland as whole,) a paean to friendship, a meditation on the usefulness - or otherwise - of literature, a celebration of what it means to be human. Anyone familiar with Greig’s fiction will recognise the affinities with it that this book displays, the same sympathetic observation of people and customs, the same sense of a writer exposing the human soul.
That disposition makes itself felt from time to time, “Most team games have their roots in warfare or fertility rituals – shinty dispenses with the fertility part,” a consideration of Deep Time with the present moment leads to a comparison with bifocal lenses, “the close-up and the long distance are true, while the middle distance is fuzzy and befuddled. Unfortunately that is where we live most of the time,” a reference to “the curious indifference of our English friends and partners to being English” indicates the vagaries of nationality. The culture of the western Highlands is illuminated via the thought that drinking is sacramental as long as it’s done in company, “what possible pleasure could there be in drinking alone?” Grieg touches on the importance of scale and size in making the Scottish landscape so alluring. The hills of Wales and the Lake and Peak districts of England are somewhat tame in comparison, “domestic,” while the Himalayas are too austere and grand. (As well as fishing, composing poetry and writing fiction Greig has mountaineering as one of his pastimes. How does he find the time to write?)
But it is literature that is a continual spur - and disappointment, a poetical apprehension of failure. “The word is an arrow that will always miss its mark. ‘The curse of literacy’.”
That disposition makes itself felt from time to time, “Most team games have their roots in warfare or fertility rituals – shinty dispenses with the fertility part,” a consideration of Deep Time with the present moment leads to a comparison with bifocal lenses, “the close-up and the long distance are true, while the middle distance is fuzzy and befuddled. Unfortunately that is where we live most of the time,” a reference to “the curious indifference of our English friends and partners to being English” indicates the vagaries of nationality. The culture of the western Highlands is illuminated via the thought that drinking is sacramental as long as it’s done in company, “what possible pleasure could there be in drinking alone?” Grieg touches on the importance of scale and size in making the Scottish landscape so alluring. The hills of Wales and the Lake and Peak districts of England are somewhat tame in comparison, “domestic,” while the Himalayas are too austere and grand. (As well as fishing, composing poetry and writing fiction Greig has mountaineering as one of his pastimes. How does he find the time to write?)
But it is literature that is a continual spur - and disappointment, a poetical apprehension of failure. “The word is an arrow that will always miss its mark. ‘The curse of literacy’.”
December 7, 2024
Der schottische Schriftsteller Andrew Greig macht sich auf den Weg nach Lochinver, um den Wunsch eines Freundes zu erfüllen. Der bat ihn , am Loch of the green corrie für ihn zu fischen. Mittlerweile sind fünf Jahre vergangen, der Freund ist gestorben und erst jetzt findet Andrew die Zeit um sich in den Norden aufzumachen. Gemeinsam mit seinen Freunden Andy der eigentlich in New York wohnt und dessen Bruder Peter, der als Arzt in Entwicklungsländern arbeitet machen sie sich auf nach Lochinver um den Mann zu suchen, der ihnen den Weg zum Loch of the green corrie zeigen kann, wenn er ihn mag.
Das Buch ist mehr als nur die Beschreibung eines Angelausflugs. Norman MacGaig war nicht nur ein Freund, sondern auch ein Poet und der Grund, warum Andrew Greig zu schreiben anfing. Er unternimmt diesen Ausflug kurz nachdem der aus dem Himalaya zurück gekommen ist. In der Einsamkeit der schottischen Highlands erinnert er sich an einen anderen Freund mit dem er fischen war: Mal Duff, der am Mount Everest starb. Für mich ist er eine vertraute Gestalt denn ich habe die Erzählungen der beiden gemeinsamen Expeditionen gelesen. Mir war nie bewusst, dass die beiden eine so tiefe Freundschaft verband. Die Art, wie Greig über diesen und andere Freunde nachdenkt hat in ihrer Ehrlichkeit etwas Rührendes an sich.
Es bleibt nicht bei diesem einen Trip. Jahre später geht Andrew Greig noch mal zum Loch of the green corrie. Vieles hat sich geändert: die Freunde von damals leben jetzt ganz in seiner Nähe, aber die sehen sich eher seltener. Er hat die Frau gefunden, die er heiraten will und fast wieder verloren. So ist das buch nicht nur die Beschreibung eines Angelausflugs, sondern auch eine Hommage an die schottischen Highlands und an seine Freunde. Und sie ist der Beweis, dass Andrew Greig zu recht Schriftsteller und Poet genannt wird.
Das Buch ist mehr als nur die Beschreibung eines Angelausflugs. Norman MacGaig war nicht nur ein Freund, sondern auch ein Poet und der Grund, warum Andrew Greig zu schreiben anfing. Er unternimmt diesen Ausflug kurz nachdem der aus dem Himalaya zurück gekommen ist. In der Einsamkeit der schottischen Highlands erinnert er sich an einen anderen Freund mit dem er fischen war: Mal Duff, der am Mount Everest starb. Für mich ist er eine vertraute Gestalt denn ich habe die Erzählungen der beiden gemeinsamen Expeditionen gelesen. Mir war nie bewusst, dass die beiden eine so tiefe Freundschaft verband. Die Art, wie Greig über diesen und andere Freunde nachdenkt hat in ihrer Ehrlichkeit etwas Rührendes an sich.
Es bleibt nicht bei diesem einen Trip. Jahre später geht Andrew Greig noch mal zum Loch of the green corrie. Vieles hat sich geändert: die Freunde von damals leben jetzt ganz in seiner Nähe, aber die sehen sich eher seltener. Er hat die Frau gefunden, die er heiraten will und fast wieder verloren. So ist das buch nicht nur die Beschreibung eines Angelausflugs, sondern auch eine Hommage an die schottischen Highlands und an seine Freunde. Und sie ist der Beweis, dass Andrew Greig zu recht Schriftsteller und Poet genannt wird.
February 10, 2018
This is mainly a memoir of a fishing trip by the author and two friends to a very remote loch in the north west of Scotland. It is based on his friendship with the poet Norman MacCaig and recollections of conversations with him and his circle of friends. On the author's last meeting with the poet, before his death, MacCaig says he must fish in the Loch of the Green Corrie of the title, which is not named as such on the map and is very inaccessible. The description and language of this trip are very poetic and there are some extraordinarily lyrical passages which almost take your breath away. There are some digressions on the geological formation of Scotland and a condensed history of the highland clans which could possibly benefit from being shortened. There is also an extended passage at the end of interviews the author conducted with the relatives or friends of Norman MacCaig and his close acquaintances. The book is a pleasure to read from the point of view of the extreme profundity and poetry of the language, ideas and images. There are also passages where the author recalls significant events from his life but because of the way in which these are described and their position in the book it is sometimes hard to get the actual sequence of these events. Highly recommended nevertheless.
July 15, 2024
This is one of the best books I’ve read about Scotland, hands down. An effortless mix of journal, history and poetic prose, it is not only a beautiful love letter to the landscape and people of Assynt, but also a really nice depiction of friendships, fishing and reflection on the things that influence us - most significantly in Greig’s case his acquaintance with the poet Norman MacCaig. I am only vaguely acquainted with MacCaig’s work myself, and I have rarely ever been fishing, but that doesn’t matter for enjoying the book. It is packed with fantastic stories and imagery that vividly stick in the mind.
The book has been sitting on our shelves for about a decade - my wife recommended it years ago but I only just got around to reading it. I’m sort of glad I left it until I’m a bit older and could better appreciate the wistful and self-reflective atmosphere it often creates, partly I guess because Greig had suffered a life threatening condition just before the main events of the book. However, the fact that the book often highlights the constant closeness of death only enhances its powerful celebration of life.
Best of all, I am heading to Assynt next month for the first time in several years, and will look on it with new eyes. Can’t wait.
The book has been sitting on our shelves for about a decade - my wife recommended it years ago but I only just got around to reading it. I’m sort of glad I left it until I’m a bit older and could better appreciate the wistful and self-reflective atmosphere it often creates, partly I guess because Greig had suffered a life threatening condition just before the main events of the book. However, the fact that the book often highlights the constant closeness of death only enhances its powerful celebration of life.
Best of all, I am heading to Assynt next month for the first time in several years, and will look on it with new eyes. Can’t wait.
August 7, 2022
Every so often, when I finish a book, I tell myself it was the best book I've read. The difference is, this time it's true! I would have given it 6 stars, if I could have.
Beautifully written, this is partly biography (Norman MacCaig), partly autobiography/reflection, partly a homage to a beautiful part of our country and its people, partly a celebration of male friendship, partly a story about fishing and geology, and (above all) an extended, poetically written assimilation of these and other matters. It was such a joy to read. MacCaig has been my hero, and Assynt my favourite place, which is why I was pointed to this book. But even had these not been the case, I would have loved the read. The text is built around MacCaig's life, friends and poetry, and examples of the latter are brilliantly peppered, in exactly the right places, to illuminate the story and reflections.
I'm sad that I've finished this book, but will be looking to read more of Andrew Greig's work. I am certain that Norman MacCaig would have approved this book wholeheartedly.
Beautifully written, this is partly biography (Norman MacCaig), partly autobiography/reflection, partly a homage to a beautiful part of our country and its people, partly a celebration of male friendship, partly a story about fishing and geology, and (above all) an extended, poetically written assimilation of these and other matters. It was such a joy to read. MacCaig has been my hero, and Assynt my favourite place, which is why I was pointed to this book. But even had these not been the case, I would have loved the read. The text is built around MacCaig's life, friends and poetry, and examples of the latter are brilliantly peppered, in exactly the right places, to illuminate the story and reflections.
I'm sad that I've finished this book, but will be looking to read more of Andrew Greig's work. I am certain that Norman MacCaig would have approved this book wholeheartedly.
October 15, 2022
Beautifully written. Memorable.
The non-linear structure is deftly handled.
This is a memoir, composed of stories about people who meant a lot to the author in a portion of his career and his life. The characters are variously three-dimensional, funny, exasperating, and Scottish. I gained an appreciation for what it means to be a Scot.
The author loves the Scottish Highlands, particularly the Assynt. I held off reading this book until I had completed a tour of the Highlands. Luckily, the tour covered the areas mentioned in the book. My having walked and driven through the same lands added a lot to my enjoyment. I have also backpacked the Sierra Nevada, and that parallels the Highlands.
I am chuffed that the author broadened my vocabulary by using so many Scottish words. Looking them up was a rewarding chore. Since my family traces it's roots to Ireland, it was heartening to learn what the Gaeltachd is and learn that it survives among the Scots.
The non-linear structure is deftly handled.
This is a memoir, composed of stories about people who meant a lot to the author in a portion of his career and his life. The characters are variously three-dimensional, funny, exasperating, and Scottish. I gained an appreciation for what it means to be a Scot.
The author loves the Scottish Highlands, particularly the Assynt. I held off reading this book until I had completed a tour of the Highlands. Luckily, the tour covered the areas mentioned in the book. My having walked and driven through the same lands added a lot to my enjoyment. I have also backpacked the Sierra Nevada, and that parallels the Highlands.
I am chuffed that the author broadened my vocabulary by using so many Scottish words. Looking them up was a rewarding chore. Since my family traces it's roots to Ireland, it was heartening to learn what the Gaeltachd is and learn that it survives among the Scots.
December 27, 2020
One of the finest books I've read and one that is likely to stick with me for a long time. Greig embarks on a fishing trip to Assynt in adherence to the wishes of his late friend - and poet - Norman MacCaig.
Across 300 pages the landscape which surrounds Greig gradually becomes a metaphor for life and how he believes it ought to be lived in order to keep it 'beautiful'.
"I sometimes think only the unfolding present moment and Deep Time are good for us, and better not to mess with the mister in-between..unfortunately that is where we live most of the time".
Greig preaches a mindfulness derived through landscape (and the exploration of that landscape) that will chime with any lover of the hills and of fishing.
Across 300 pages the landscape which surrounds Greig gradually becomes a metaphor for life and how he believes it ought to be lived in order to keep it 'beautiful'.
"I sometimes think only the unfolding present moment and Deep Time are good for us, and better not to mess with the mister in-between..unfortunately that is where we live most of the time".
Greig preaches a mindfulness derived through landscape (and the exploration of that landscape) that will chime with any lover of the hills and of fishing.
August 20, 2022
I don't think I would have picked up this book if it wasn't set as a book club read, but it was much more interesting that I had expected.
Ostensibly a fishing memoir and look into the lives of dead Scottish poets and their hangers on, there were a number of stories about the authors life in the telling that make it more interesting. If only the author would stop teasing the reader with little insights here and there, much in the way a fish is teased by the fisherman. It's also hard to keep track of who is who, with minor characters being introduced for little or no reason other than to give them a name check.
Ostensibly a fishing memoir and look into the lives of dead Scottish poets and their hangers on, there were a number of stories about the authors life in the telling that make it more interesting. If only the author would stop teasing the reader with little insights here and there, much in the way a fish is teased by the fisherman. It's also hard to keep track of who is who, with minor characters being introduced for little or no reason other than to give them a name check.
April 30, 2024
Expected to love this but it was only ok.
It's decently enough written, but I would have liked to hear a lot more about McCaig, his work, his times, and the other writers connected to him.
Subject-wise, the book is absolutely all over the place, and not in a very interesting way either. More in a highly self-indulgent way. To be brutally frank I ended up really not caring about the author, his life, or his thoughts about this, that, or the other.
To write in this way and have a chance of pulling it off I'm afraid you'd need to be a person who is incredibly admired, or even loved, by the reader.
It's decently enough written, but I would have liked to hear a lot more about McCaig, his work, his times, and the other writers connected to him.
Subject-wise, the book is absolutely all over the place, and not in a very interesting way either. More in a highly self-indulgent way. To be brutally frank I ended up really not caring about the author, his life, or his thoughts about this, that, or the other.
To write in this way and have a chance of pulling it off I'm afraid you'd need to be a person who is incredibly admired, or even loved, by the reader.
February 28, 2018
The author goes on a quest to fish at the Loch of the Green Corrie, the spot in Assynt that his late friend, Norman McCaig, had seen as a magical and hugely significant spot. His quest to land a fish on a couple of trips, first with friends and then alone, is unsuccessful but the experience is important in that it gives him the opportunity to connect with the land, it's people, McCaig's spirit and most importantly, himself, as he considers his past and future through the peace and tranquillity of the present moment in North West Highlands.
December 22, 2023
This was a great read and story so well put together. Was interested to read that Norman MacCaig was friends with Iain Crichton Smith who I knew and was my English teacher when I attended High School, another very clever man and a great poet. The only negative comment I would make is that disappointed with author when referring to shinty sticks he described them as the men wielding hockey sticks like clubs. Shinty sticks are nothing like hockey sticks and are traditionally made by experts for this great Highland game.
July 1, 2018
I've only read 2 of Andrew Greig's books, When They Lay Bare and That Summer, but he is one of my favourite authors. Early on in this book I didn't warm to the man himself, but it is beautifully written and he won me over by the end. I suspect a man full of charm, but an author full of good judgement. The change from the single thread of the trip to the Loch of the Green Corrie to the last quarter of the book which flits in and out of a second trip works really well.
August 28, 2018
A tribute to the Scottish Poet Norman MacCaig against the backdrop of fishing in the wildness of the north west Highlands in Assynt. Also the memories of Andrew Greig, a poet and writer with roots in Fife. Respectful, playful, wistful and at times sentimental, this pays generous homage to the poet, the landscape and a generation of Scottish writers. For me, doesn't quite come off as well as Andrew Greig's homage to the game of golf in Scotland, but really enjoyable nevertheless.
November 11, 2025
The beautiful prose in this book, the descriptions of people and places has led me to want to visit Assynt - even with a tent! It is just beautifully written and very thought provoking. It isn’t a rip-roaring, page-turning romance or thriller. It is a touching book of friendship, of past times, of the beauty and wilderness of Scotland and I had my Ordnance Survey map of the area by my side so I had a better picture in my mind of where I was reading about. Just beautiful.
September 24, 2024
A departure from the books I usually read but very enjoyable as anyone who loves Scotland and its people will appreciate. A sensory delight in the descriptions of the ‘hills’, the smell of damp tents and whiskey. Not really about fishing at all but of memory and friendships, relationships and our own individual place in the world.
January 8, 2025
Perfect! It’s taken me almost 7 years to finish this book, I just couldn’t bear to, I needed to still have it there unfinished for when I was ready to hear what Andrew Greig had to tell me. And now it seems I was finally ready and here it is, finished on purpose as my first book of this new year. Thank you - 7 ⭐️
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