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Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend April 16, 2006 Spotlight on ‘The River Why’ By BILL VARBLE Mail Tribune The downside of being the author of a modern classic is that it keeps trying to pull you away from your writing desk. In the two decades since David James Duncan’s "The River Why" was published, he’s lost track of how many hundreds of times he’s left home to give talks about it. "I’ve tried to pull back," Duncan says. "I have 1,500 pages of fiction in four boxes, three novels and some novellas. I like ‘em all. It’s time to finish them." "The River Why" is the subject of Jackson County Reads, a program aimed at getting everybody in the community to read — and talk about — the same book. Organized by the Jackson County Library and its foundation, the project mirrors similar ones that have become popular around the country. "The River Why" is the story of Augustus "Gus" Orviston, a young fly fisherman who leaves his home and family to fish an Oregon coastal river. Like Norman Maclean’s "A River Runs Through It," the book has become a perennial favorite and remains in print. It is about fishing, about coming of age, about love and our place in the natural world and the nature of religion. In a telephone interview, Duncan, who grew up around Portland and now lives on a trout stream in western Montana, says "The River Why" began as a sidetrack and had to force its way into the world. Advertisement "I came to writing through grief," he says. "Losing my brother and my best friend at 13. No adult or teacher could say anything helpful in relieving the pain." He began to read serious novels to cope. The first one that truly affected him was Thomas Mann’s 1901 classic "Buddenbrooks," in which a young boy dies. "Mann made grief beautiful," Duncan says. At 17, knowing only "how to fish and how to raise hell," he decided he would be a writer and make grief beautiful. He started writing terribly serious fiction. "I wanted be Troutdale’s Thomas Mann," he says, laughing. And the novel? "It was so heavy it would rip the sutures out of a fresh face lift." So he found himself trying to write goofy fishing scenes into the story as comic relief. He figured he’d allow himself a few days getting the fishing stuff out of his system. Like Topsy, the book that would be "The River Why" just grew. It still has a serious side, touching in fact on issues people have killed each other over for centuries. "But I found a way of de-fusing it," he says. "You could talk about it if you changed religion or politics to fishing." This plays into an award-wining essay titled "My Advice On Writing Advice," in which Duncan, after dispensing to writer wannabes such advice as "STOP NOW" and "QUIT LIT," wrote that the real key is to have "f-u-n." He credits the idea to Rex Stout, author of the Nero Wolfe detective books. It’s a special kind of fun, one in which the writer opens to joy, pain or sorrow coming as they will. At community reading events writers inevitably encounter people outside their normal readership. Strangers whose literary taste may run, say, to Louis L’Amour. "They think I’m from Mars," Duncan says. "But I’ve had really interesting experiences." He was speaking at a town where he’d helped create an art center. A woman there had lost three sons in a plane crash. Duncan joked in his talk about the smell of a pulp mill, recalling a smelly butt joke. An old man hung around the reading until everybody was gone. "He said he was deeply offended by my talking about the stink of the mill that supported his family for 40 years," Duncan says. "I told him I was really sorry, and I was trying to speak to a broad audience. The boys were teens, and teen humor seemed appropriate." Duncan talked about his brother, and the man said his brother had been the same age when he’d died in World War II. Tears streamed down his face. "I don’t think either of us has forgotten," Duncan says. Duncan, who spoke in Medford in 1997, is also the author of "The Brothers K," "River Teeth" and "My Story as Told by Water." "The River Why" was also the subject of a community reading project in Deschutes County. "Trout Grass," an independent film he wrote and appeared in, was shown this month at the Ashland Independent Film Festival. He doesn’t buy into the notion that writers do anything unique." "That’s kind of a hoax," he says. "It makes me uncomfortable. I’m doing my job, like a guy getting the hay in." Reach reporter Bill Varble at 776-4478 or e-mail Spotlight on �The River Why� ">[email protected] . Mail Tribune Home | Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life | Opinion AP News | Archives | Site Map | Community | Classified Copyright © 1997-2006 Mail Tribune, Inc. All rights reserved. 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