Just made tentative arrangements to visit Denmark in June, partly at the invitation of the secretary of the Danish Angling Association - Per Ekstrom - who I met in London last summer and partly to accompany my best pal who, being married to Dane Bodil, has assimilated Denmark into his blood. I'll fish for pike and there's a tantalising promise of some exciting sea fishing (a contact has a boat!) with suggestions we might catch salmon and turbot - a fish I have only ever come across in Edwardian restaurant menus.
I sent Per a copy of The Complete Angler in memory of the first publication in Danish of Izaak Walton's timeless work. The translation was published secretly in 1940 as a reaction against the German invasion, the publication echoing the volume of 1653 which came off the press in similar circumstances during the Commonwealth of Oliver Cromwell.
Over dinner in London last year, Per, incredibly generously, presented me with a 1945 copy of Den Fuldkomne Fisker beautifully bound in calf. I can only read of few words of the Danish text but it exudes the very spirit of Walton!
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