What happens when the oceans are emptied of all their fish? What
happens when three hundred years of human knowledge and expertise
disappear before the onslaught of the technology-driven world?
The Doryman's Reflection is simply the most accurate and eloquent
account of what transpired in the New England fisheries over the past
half century, as told by the people who lived it, including author Paul
Molyneaux.
Fishermen survive as relics, the last hunter-gatherers among us. Their
boats, crammed with ropes and nets, carry the mystique of a nearly
forgotten world ruled by the elements. Now an accomplished writer,
Molyneaux as a young man journeyed to Maine with no experience and a
dream of working on a boat. This is the story of his apprenticeship with
Bernard Raynes, one of Maine's last independent commercial fishermen.
The Doryman's Reflection speaks to those who want to know what really
happened, and what will happen, on our oceans.
Part coming-of-age memoir, part biography, it is a very personal account
of what families in this dying but important industry face each day.
Molyneaux shares his own history as a young man seeking the fisherman's
life in Maine and Alaska. Originally published in 2005, it has been
thoroughly updated to cover the events of the past ten years.
Told through the life of the colorful and engaging Bernard Raynes, The
Doryman's Reflection is alive and real and powerful--far from a dry,
pedantic treatise on the economics of commercial fishing.
