Sportsman's Library: 100 Essential, Engaging, Offbeat, And Occasionally Odd Fishing And Hunting Books For The Adventurous Reader

I was an early subscriber to Gray’s Sporting Journal. During the eleven years Stephan Bodio wrote his review column, it became the first thing I turned to whenever a new issue would arrive.I was in Alaska from the late 70’s until the end of 2008. The many books I bought and read based on his recommendations had a cumulative effect on my life. I wound up as Commissioner of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and my reading helped with the approach I tried to bring to that job.When I heard that Bodio had written the compiled reviews of A Sportsman’s Library, I was delighted and immediately ordered it. It was even better than I expected, and I ordered three more copies for family and hunting companions.I’ve read a bit over a third of Bodio’s picks and look forward to years of reading pleasure based on the rest of the recommendations. I’m afraid, however, that Jameson Parker is correct in his forward when he says Library ($13.97 trade paperback) may turn out to be the most expensive book you’ll ever buy.This is a great book, and my only criticism echoes an earlier commenter who pointed out its only flaw was that Bodio did not recommend any of his own books (in particular, do not miss Querencia).

An excellent review of truly essential books plucked from a voluminous literature on hunting, fishing, and related pastimes. I had read perhaps 30 of them before, and I've resolved to read most of the rest (intellectual warmth for the cold winter nights in the season and in my life). I was happy to see Sheridan Anderson's "Curtis Creek Manifesto" as the lead-in, even if it was in that iconic place solely by Anderson's A. I had no quibble whatsoever with the other selections, and I'm glad it was only 100 because collecting firsts of many of them is going to be expensive. But the best part of this book is the offbeat and the odd. Books such as Gavin Maxwell's "Harpoon Venture" never (until now) show up in outdoor book reviews and anthologies, yet they are part of a strong if arcane literature that derives from the same interests that brought us Curtis Creek, and they provide significant alternative insight into the genesis of our devotion to hunting and fishing.My only quibble, and the reason I give it only four stars, is that a few of the accounts suffer from inaccuracies that a quick fact check would have unearthed and presumably rectified. Two examples are (1) Jack O'Connor's memoir was actually entitled "Horse and Buggy West," not "Horse and Buggy Days," and (2) Bodio's review of Jim Corbett's "Man Eaters of Kumaon" mixed two of Corbett's most memorable tiger hunting adventures into one. That is, in the tale he quoted (the Chowgarh Tigers) he accurately recounted Corbett's collecting a nest of nightjar eggs moments before he encountered the elder Chowgarh man-eater at very close quarters, but Bodio mistakenly cited Corbett's encounter with the sleeping Mohan man-eater (from a different chapter in Corbett's book) and thus didn't tell us the story of Corbett's final meeting with the wide-awake Chowgarh tigress at less than eight feet. That's too bad because that encounter was considerably more thrilling, and far more terrifying, than the encounter with the sleeping Mohan man-eater. But those minor quibbles aside, Sportsman's Library, like all of Stephen Bodio's books, is worth reading with care and then reading again, to find all the information you missed the first time and to enjoy once again Bodio's dry humor and profound knowledge of the outdoor sporting life.

I had one of those inexplicable brain farts recently. Stephen Bodio asked me to write the forward for his latest book, A Sportsman's Library (Lyons Press). I was delighted to be asked and delighted to do it, but when the book came out, for some reason I thought it would be inappropriate for me to review a book which has my name on the cover. I pulled my copy down the other day to look up something and it suddenly struck me: Dummy, this ain't your book. Go ahead and review the sucker.A Sportsman's Library is subtitled, 100 Essential, Engaging, Offbeat, and Occasionally Odd Fishing and Hunting Books for the Adventurous Reader, which pretty much sums it up, with two notable omissions. Each of the selections is a unique, well-written book in its own right, but what the title doesn't tell you or even hint at is the extraordinary range of this volume. Only Steve Bodio could have written a book that encompasses the best books on hunting and fishing--and sometimes cooking what you have hunted and fished for--from Emperor Frederick II's De Arte Venandi cum Avibus (which I'm sure you all immediately recognize as translating to The Art of Hunting with Birds, more commonly translated and known as The Art of Falconry) written sometime before the Emperor's death in 1250, to Brian Plummer's very funny late-twentieth century Tales of a Rat-Hunting Man. Think about it for a moment: that's over seven centuries worth of literature. Who else, other than Steve Bodio, could possibly have the knowledge to be able to write intelligently about seven centuries worth of sporting literature? God knows I couldn't.The other item the title doesn't hint at is Steve's own writing. Each selection is introduced by him, and as singer-songwriter and writer Tom Russell says in his blurb on the back cover, "Steve Bodio is not only one of our finest `sporting' and `nature' writers, he is one of our finest American writers. Period." Each of those introductions is why the book is worth owning and reading even if you have zero interest in hunting or fishing. I don't care how much you know or think you know about Hemingway or Faulkner or Theodore Roosevelt or T. H. White or Isak Dinesen or any of the other writers he covers in this beautifully illustrated book, each of Steve's introductions will gracefully introduce you to a new facet of that person's life, a new way of thinking about that particular writer. Of course, for the most part, Steve introduces us all to writers we've never even heard of, and he does it so well and with such compelling grace, that the temptation is to empty the checking account buying up copies of books by people we didn't know existed. All in all, it is a remarkable book, and one I highly recommend.And if you need another reason to buy it, I happen to know there is a rather amusing forward written by...by, hold on, it's...no, don't tell me...damn, the name escapes me at the moment...

A unique book written by a most unique sportsman, scholar, and writer. If you think you know the majority of the great sporting authors and tales, take a seat, and consider that you may have to think again. My own library in this genre is vast, and I've authored columns and articles on the subject, but Steve Bodio leaves me feeling like a rank amateur and he does it with his ever present grace and style.