Aleck Maury, Sportsman

By Caroline Gordon

Book Overview

"It is, in a sense, a prose Aeneid, written with so much economy and constraint that the reader is only aware at the end that he has been following the wanderings of a hero." Thus did Andrew Nelson Lytle, in a 1934NewRepublicreview, capture the essence of Car­oline Gordon's novel inspired by the life of her father, a supreme hunter and fisherman.

Caroline Gordon wanted to call her novel "The Life and Passion of Aleck Maury," an apt title for the story of a man passionately drawn to the rites, rituals, and excitement of hunting and fishing. Gordon describes these rituals with a precision that even Hemingway would admire. The result, as Lytle points out, is that she makes "hunting and angling appear so exciting that a reader who has never had a gun or rod in his hand will not lay down the book until he has reached the end."

Aleck Maury earned his living as a pro­fessorof classics, but found books and classes pale in comparison with blood sport. Only in the world of sport is Maury truly alive, for only there are the rules exact; in the world of sport Maury is an artist, a creator in control. He prepares until he is ready, then tries his hand at the game. The rituals of blood sport lend structure to his life. From these rituals come elation, a formal delight.

For Maury, life without joy, without transfiguring excitement, is not worth living. Throughout his life he has been a questing Aeneas. Delight has given direction to his search, and in the end he understands: "I knew now what it was I had always feared: that this elation, this delight by which I lived might go from me."

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0809309882
• ISBN13: 9780809309887
• Release Date: November 1980
• Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press
• Length: 310 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.5" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

An absolutely beautiful book

I read "Aleck Maury, Sportsman" when I worked at Southern Illinois University Press, which published the novel in its Lost American Fiction series. I reread it several years later with even more pleasure. The novel reads like a memoir, but has its own deep springs. I do not know of a more sensitive portrait of a person, and the prose is as lovely as the loop of a fly line uncurling on a fine cast. Because fishing is a topic of both novels, "Aleck Maury" reminds me distantly of "A River Runs Through It"--also a fine and pure novel, but not so fine and pure as "Aleck Maury."

Aleck Maury Sportsman - A novel by caroline gordon

"It is, in a sense, a prose AENEID, written with so much economy and constraint that the reader is only aware at the end that he has been following the wanderings of a hero." -Andrew Nelson Lytle, New Republic (1934)

Absolutely Lyrical

A minor classic that is too often overlooked. The pure aesthetic beauty and simplicity of Gordon's language is a revelation.

A masterpiece of Sport and the pursuit of excellence.

This highly regarded but not widely known masterpiece chronicles the life of Aleck Maury from his earliest forays into opossum hunting and flyfishing to his latter days of quail hunting and fishing in old age. His lifelong quest of excellence in the field conflicts with his commitments to family and social responsibility. The novel is based on the author's father. Ms. Gordon was the wife of Allen Tate, the noted literary critic and poet. The Agrarian context and concerns of Tate are evident in her work, though her writings are unique. She shows herself here and in her other novels to be a master of her craft.