The River Why - Eddy Quotes

Eddy

Eddy changes Gus in three different ways: when she directly interacts with him, by her absence and by her reappearance. On their first encounter with one another Gus is compelled by her differences in dress, techniques and gear. After she leaves, Gus feels a "need" to fulfill his empty life. Finally when she shows back up in his life, Gus then has everything he could ever ask for: a beautiful woman who loves to fish, just like him.

Page 151: "A barefoot girl. A full-grown one. One who wore the top tenth or so of what had long ago been a pair of blue jeans. One who wore a short, skin-tight, sleeveless sky-colored t-shirt through Ð'...which revealed the shape of theÐ'..."

Gus describes his first view Eddy, after having snuck his way up to the tree where she sat "motionless" not noticing him. His attention is soon diverted, if not completely towards her odd pole and gear. Lying to himself as he checked out this "research project" he notices how her gear is like nothing he had seen or used before, but his mind never full wonders from Eddy. (Page 151)

Page 151: "Her fishing equipment was innovative also; she appeared to have no creel or equipage or container of any kind apart form her pole and line and whatever was on the end of it. There was the possibility of a few spare hooks or leaders in the pockets of the fraction of blue jeans Ð'...but the theory grew tenuousÐ'...As to the possibility of fishing tackle concealed with in the sky-colored t-shirt, this was even less likely. Nevertheless I considered the problem long and carefully, scanning every least curve of the thin material, reluctant to give up the search."

While Gus is checking her style out he realizes that Eddy was important and he needed to learn from her. He describes his sudden thirst for knowledge about Eddy as follows:

Page 150: "She must be an extraordinary person, well worth watching, well worth meeting, well worth thinking about, an exceptional fisherman, and I was, what I was, I was learning, yes learning: I was learning like crazy. I'd never learned so much so fast beforeÐ'..."

Watching Eddy fish, Gus absorbs a lot of information that before was totally unseen to him. Not only about fishing, but about this woman and about himself, needing to learn from her. He says on page 152 "I felt for the first time that I was in the presence of a fishing genius exceeding my own." He is enthralled by her fishing abilities and when she stripes naked to dive after the fish she snagged, Gus was completely spellbound. He watches Eddy get her prize of a fish and he follows Eddy. When Eddy notices Gus there she froze, not knowing what to do about some guy come up to her mumbling saying "What muck. I mean lut, orm, umÐ'..." and "Me gog peech inspediment. M-m-my I juss a marmaless fissamren." (Page 156)

Gus feeling like a complete fool dives deep into the river and tries to block it all out, but eventually gets out and runs away from his scene of complete stupidity. He cuts himself running through the brush and eventually climbs a tree to carry out his plan of falling out of it. Fortunately Eddy was still on her rock and Gus got the courage to talk to her.

Page 158: "I forgot I had a body the moment I say hers."

As they conversed, Gus begins to fall back on his old language, because talking like himself left his mouth all jumbled, and begins reciting Izaak Walton. He smiles give him the courage to go on, and his heart compelled him to learn more about this new found passion. When Eddy tries to leave Gus asks her to not go, and when she asks why not, he replies from a passage of a book:

Page 158: "No life, honest scholar, no life so happy and so pleasant as the life of a well-governed angler!"

Gus and Eddy exchange names, in between the times Gus could actually make coherent words, and then Eddy got a bite on her line. As Eddy was diving after it, Gus came crashing down the tree to help and Eddy took off. Gus then goes a little insane by running to his car and flooring it to find the running Eddy.

Page 161: "If she got away before I found out something more about herÐ'... I'd never see her again!"

This prospect scared Gus because Eddy had given him a purpose for something way more in life, a purpose of needing someone else and to love. He stayed in that very tree waiting for her, but she never showed up again. Gus did find her fishing rod though and kept it. Gus then goes into a short of depression after he Ð''loses' Eddy and the next day he speaks with the River Why.

"You're rightÐ'...This