John N. Maclean takes a break on the iconic Big Blackfoot River in Montana. Photo by Rebecca Stumpf, via Field & Stream.
Norman Maclean is probably responsible for introducing more people to fly fishing than any other author, via the print and film versions of “A River Runs Through It.” But what many anglers don’t know is that Maclean’s son, John, is also an accomplished author who is in many ways carrying on the family traditions. In a great profile in Field & Stream by Maggie Doherty and Rebecca Stumpf, the younger Maclean talks about growing up between Chicago and Seeley Lake, Montana, and how this perspective has formed the ways he views nature and society. Early on on, he fell in love with Hemingway’s “Big Two-Hearted River,” which has remained a touchstone for decades:
Maclean said his father shared the story with him when he was 13 years old. After reading it, he was able to make sense of this geographic split that also splintered spirit. The appeal of “Big Two-Hearted River” was that, for the first time, the father and son found literature and fly fishing in one contained story. Maclean still remembers how it felt when he first read the story: “I can be in Chicago and move my imagination to a trout stream,” he told me. “I really liked the Nick Adams stories because here’s this Midwestern kid, and he was living this wonderful outdoor life.”
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