A foundational environmentalist text centuries ahead of its time, The Compleat Angler is one of the most reprinted books in the English language. From the ruins of the English Civil War to the challenges we all face today, Gareth Brookes’ highly original multimedia adaptation of Izaak Walton’s classic focuses on its instructional aspects, highlights its eccentricities and contemplative themes of nature and friendship, and draws parallels between today’s politically divided and ecologically endangered England and that of the 17th century.
Following Brookes’ similarly ambitious The Dancing Plague, this adaptation is lovingly rendered in both linocut engraving and hand-drawn pen-and-ink to contrast the meditative and the instructional in Walton’s writing. As a guidebook on how to fish, this 350-year-old manual makes the perfect gift for any angling enthusiast, and its reflective writing connects with post-pandemic desires for calm, mindful pursuits and a return to nature.
Gareth Brookes is a graphic novelist, print maker, textile artist, small press publisher, teacher, event organiser, and researcher. He graduated from the RCA in 2003. He makes experimental graphic novels and handmade comics utilizing unusual materials such as embroidery, pressed flowers and fire. In 2012, he won the First Graphic Novel Prize. His graphic novels The Black Project and A Thousand Coloured Castles are published by Myriad Editions, The Dancing Plague is published by SelfMadeHero. His teaching experience includes being a tutor in Foundation Studies at City & Guilds of London Art School for six years, and a visiting lecturer in Illustration at the University of Lincoln. He organised the South London Comics and Zine Fair in 2017-18 and is currently a AHRC Techne funded PhD candidate at UAL researching materiality and metaphor in comics.
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