548
WRIGHT MORRIS
•
In
Death in the Afternoon:
There comes a place in the guidebook where you must say do
not come back until you have skied, had sexual intercourse, shot
quail or grouse, or been to the bullfight so that you will know what
we are talking about.
That much we know beyond a doubt. What he was talking
about. Life and death, and that dance he would describe
as
grace under pressure. But as for the story, there
is
one and one
only that he would tell us. Nature is good, man
is
a
m~,
but
Nature will prevail. "We'll all be gone before it's changed too
much and if no deluge comes when we are gone it still will
rain in summer in the north and hawks will nest
in
the Cathedral
at Santiago and in La Granja.... it makes no difference if the
fountains play or not."
The "Big Two-Hearted River" that rises in Michigan flows,
like the Liffey, around the world. In it he dips his line, and
hauls out the changeless immortal trout.
Holding him near the tail, hard to hold, alive, in his hand, he
whacked him against the log. The trout quivered, rigid. Nick laid
him
on the log in the shade and broke the neck of the other
fish
the same way. He laid them side by side on the log. They were
fine trout.
In Spain-
They were all about the same size. I laid them out, side by side,
all
their heads pointing the same way, and looked at them. They were
beautifully colored and firm and hard from the cold water.... I
took the trout ashore, washed them in the cold, smoothly heavy
water above the dam, and then picked some ferns and packed them
all in a bag, three trout on a layer of ferns, then another layer of
ferns, then three more trout, and then covered . them with. ferns.
They looked nice in the ferns, and now the bag was bulky, and
r
put it in the shade of the tree.
.
We have Harold Loeb's testimony that these fish
~ere
never
