The Fish
Elizabeth Bishop
I caught a tremendous fish
and held him beside the boat
half out of water, with my hook
fast in a corner of his mouth.
He didn't fight.
He hadn't fought at all.
He hung a grunting weight,
battered and venerable
and homely. Here and there
his brown skin hung in strips
like ancient wallpaper,
and its pattern of darker brown
was like wallpaper:
shapes like full-blown roses
stained and lost through age.
He was speckled with barnacles,
fine rosettes of lime,
and infested
with tiny white sea-lice,
and underneath two or three
rags of green weed hung down.
While his gills were breathing in
the terrible oxygen
—the frightening gills,
fresh and crisp with blood,
that can cut so badly—
I thought of the coarse white flesh
packed in like feathers,
the big bones and the little bones,
the dramatic reds and blacks
of his shiny entrails,
and the pink swim-bladder
like a big peony.
I looked into his eyes
which were far larger than mine
but shallower, and yellowed,
the irises backed and packed
with tarnished tinfoil
seen through the lenses
of old scratched isinglass.
They shifted a little, but not
to return my stare.
—It was more like the tipping
of an object toward the light.
I admired his sullen face,
the mechanism of his jaw,
and then I saw
that from his lower lip
—if you could call it a lip—
grim, wet, and weaponlike,
hung five old pieces of fish-line,
or four and a wire leader
with the swivel still attached,
with all their five big hooks
grown firmly in his mouth.
A green line, frayed at the end
where he broke it, two heavier lines,
and a fine black thread
still crimped from the strain and snap
when it broke and he got away.
Like medals with their ribbons
frayed and wavering,
a five-haired beard of wisdom
trailing from his aching jaw.
I stared and stared
and victory filled up
the little rented boat,
from the pool of bilge
where oil had spread a rainbow
around the rusted engine
to the bailer rusted orange,
the sun-cracked thwarts,
the oarlocks on their strings,
the gunnels—until everything
was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!
And I let the fish go.
Vocabulary
• Venerable – old and respected
• Barnacles – molluscs that cling to the bottom of a ship or boat
• Entrails – guts or internal organs of a fish
• Isinglass – a jelly like substance found in some fish
• Rosettes – small flower like patterns
• Peony – bright red flower
• Bilge – dirty water collected in the bottom of a boat
Pre-reading task
• Have you ever caught a fish? What was the experience like?
• What expectations did the title create when you first read it?
Questions
1. How does the poet describe the moment when she caught the fish?
2. Does anything strike you as unusual about how the fish behaved when it was
caught?
3. What is the poet’s initial reaction to the fish?
4. How does she describe the fish?
5. What similes does she use to describe the fish?
6. ‘Terrible oxygen’, ‘frightening gills’, ‘crisp with blood’. What do these quotes tell
us about the poet’s feelings or response to the fish?
7. The poet describes the fish’s eyes in detail. Pick out some phrases she uses. Why
do you think she concentrates on the eyes?
8. The poet then focusses on the fish’s mouth. What details does she notice? What
hints does it give us about its past?
9. What do you think the line –‘victory filled up the little rented boat’ means?
10. Why do you think the poet let the fish go?
Page 1
Overview
This deeply personal poem captures a moment of revelation for the poet. The setting and
story of the poem are everyday and ordinary. The poet (a keen angler) has caught a large,
‘venerable’ fish which surprisingly has not put up much of a fight.
She is initially fascinated and somewhat revolted by the fish, describing in detail its body
both inside and out. On closer inspection she focusses on the eyes and begins to identify
with the fish on a human level.
Next she examines its mouth and realises that the line of old hooks stuck in its jaw are
actually scars of battle and a record of the fish’s previous escapes.
She realises that she has no need to keep and kill the fish – that ‘victory filled up the little
rented boat’.
Out of respect for the fish as a worthwhile adversary she lets it go to fight another day.
Key Points
• Deeply Personal
• Vivid Imagery
• Nature
• Moment of revelation
• Autobiographical
• Beauty in the ordinary
Page 2
Word Bank
• Create a bank of words you might use when writing about the poet’s work.
• Some are provided for you.
• Add your own.
• You can write definitions of words you don’t know.
• You can pick out suitable quotes to go with the words.
• Intense
• Melancholy
• Graphic
• Personal
• Autobiographical
• Descriptive
• Evocative
• Realistic
• Thought provoking
• Challenging
• Detailed
Page 3
Past Questions
Honours
2019
2017
2016
2013
Page 4
2009
2006
Page 5
Ordinary
2019
Page 1
2013
Page 2
Mind Map
Page 3
