Richard Brautigan and Catfish Poetics [by Laura Orem]

Richard Brautigan is well-known in hippie circles as the author of the 1967 novel, Trout Fishing in America, a kind of bible for the counter-culture. He was also a poet of considerable talent, although his poetry was not successful during his lifetime and is still not widely known today.

The details of Brautigan's life are obscure and hard to come by. He was born in Tacoma, Washington in 1935; ended up in San Francisco at the beginning of the Beat movement; married and fathered a child; divorced; went to Japan and married again; divorced again; taught sporadically and reluctantly; and resolutely refused to be interviewed. He committed suicide at his home in Bolinas, California in 1984; his body lay undiscovered for over a month. Sad stuff.

His poetry is worth revisiting. Some of it is available online, both at the Academy of American Poets website and at the Brautigan Bibliography and Archive , along with such biographical information as is available. Although associated with the Beats, he is not really a Beat poet. His poems resist category - funny, wry, melancholy, biting, tender, sometimes cruel: they are all these things and more.

Here's one of my favorites, suitable for reciting on country walks by meandering streams.

"Your Catfish Friend"

If I were to live my life
in catfish forms
in scaffolds of skin and whiskers
at the bottom of a pond
and you were to come by
    one evening
when the moon was shining
down into my dark home
and stand there at the edge
    of my affection
and think, "It's beautiful
here by this pond. I wish
    someone loved me,"
I'd love you and be your catfish
friend and drive such lonely
thoughts from your mind
and suddenly you would be
    at peace,
and ask yourself, "I wonder
if there are any catfish
in this pond? It seems like
a perfect place for them."

from The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster , Houghton Mifflin, 1989.

Comments

[Rachel Barenblat]

Wow, I haven't read Brautigan in ages; thanks for this reminder!

[Kath]

Glad you reminded us of him. It was my great surprise to discover him in a pile of garage sale books I got in the late 80's. Great memories.

[Ken Tucker]

It's great to see a Brautigan poem here--I can picture the cover of "Trout Fishing In America" as I read it. I've been reading a number of Don Carpenter's novels (another neglected writer) and discovered that Brautigan and Carpenter were friends--and also suicides. But they need to be remembered for their still-very-lively work.

[Andrew J. Bowlby]

One of my favourite authors. Thanks to Diane Budwit who introduced me to his writings back in late 70's.