The book could have been titled “Everything you always wanted to know about Restigouche (but never dared to ask)”. It’s a guided trip on a magnificent river that originates in the Appalachians, winding 200 kilometers between New Brunswick and Quebec before emptying into Chaleur Bay, between Dalhousie and Miguasha.
On board his Special guide of 22 feet with a square stern steered by pole, Philip Lee is an excellent guide, he who seems to have fished in all the pools and traveled hundreds of kilometers over the years on this mythical river, where on a clear day you can “distinguish each pebble from the bottom of the river from one bank to the other”.
“How is it possible,” asks the author of Restigouche. The long course of the wild river, that all the great political movements of the industrial age have proven incapable of pursuing their goals without destroying the systems that support life on earth? »
And New Brunswick, long tied hand and foot to industry, provides a fine example, a province which, of all the territories and provinces of Canada, “is among the least inclined to protect natural spaces.”
And while rivers are remarkably resilient, “they do not wash away our sins.” So in the summer of 2018, he decided to go down the course of the river, from its source to its mouth.
A legendary place for salmon fishing, the Restigouche quickly attracted wealthy Americans from the Gilded Age (literally “Golden Period”) at the end of the 19th centurye century. An exclusive playground that, in many ways, Philip Lee tells us, endures today.
The author stages his investigation in the field, recounts his preparations, organizes meetings with a few hand-picked participants — including several members of the First Nations — and gives us the story of his journey in three stages. He questions the ghosts of the past and brings to life the incredible commercial salmon fishing in Chaleur Bay.
Born in 1963, Philip Lee has been teaching journalism at Saint-Thomas University in New Brunswick for twenty years. He was editor-in-chief of Telegraph-Journal, the main English daily newspaper in the province. He is also the author of a book on the decline of Atlantic salmon.
From the expulsion of the Acadians to the famous “salmon crisis” of June 1981, when Quebec police officers and fisheries guards beat and arrested members of the Listuguj First Nation, Philip Lee tells us everything, flaying at the passage “the aberrant history of the management of this river”. Passing, of course, by the hyperpowerful Irving family, which reigns over New Brunswick like a dynasty and which has skillfully appropriated certain fishing rights on the river.
A fascinating and necessary book, in many respects, but whose flow is weak and a little meandering, sometimes giving us the impression of not moving forward, either in a canoe or in the story.
And, of course, our guide teases salmon along the way. Definition and moral of this exercise which flirts with poetry? “Salmon fishing is all about trying to convince a non-feeding fish to eat something that would never be part of its diet. »