Catching the Big Fish, David Lynch
Catching the Big Fish, David Lynch
9 Rating(s)
List: $12.00 | Sale: $8.41
Club: $6.00

Catching the Big Fish
Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity

Author: David Lynch

Narrator: David Lynch

Unabridged: 1 hr 48 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Penguin Audio

Published: 12/28/2006

Synopsis

In this “unexpected delight” (The Boston Globe), visionary filmmaker, musician, and actor David Lynch describes his personal methods of capturing and working with ideas, and the immense creative benefits he has experienced from the practice of meditation.

David Lynch’s Catching the Big Fish provides a rare window into the internationally acclaimed filmmaker’s methods as an artist, his personal working style, and the immense creative benefits he has experienced from the practice of meditation.

Catching the Big Fish comes as a revelation to the legion of fans who have longed to better understand Lynch’s personal vision. And it is equally compelling to those who wonder how they can nurture their own creativity.

Catching Ideas

Ideas are like fish.

If you want to catch little fish, you can stay in the shallow water. But if you want to catch the big fish, you’ve got to go deeper.

Down deep, the fish are more powerful and more pure. They’re huge and abstract. And they’re very beautiful.

I look for a certain kind of fish that is important to me, one that can translate to cinema. But there are all kinds of fish swimming down there. There are fish for business, fish for sports. There are fish for everything.

Everything, anything that is a thing, comes up from the deepest level. Modern physics calls that level the Unified Field. The more your consciousness—your awareness—is expanded, the deeper you go toward this source, and the bigger the fish you can catch.

—from Catching the Big Fish

About The Author

Three-time Oscar-nominated director David Lynch is among the top filmmakers of our era. He recently received a Golden Lion Award for lifetime achievement at the Venice Film Festival, adding to a long list of honors and awards. His popular and critically acclaimed films have been credited with propelling independent and avant-garde films into the mainstream. Lynch speaks regularly to standing-room crowds on a variety of topics. In 2005, he founded the David Lynch Foundation for Consciousness-Based Education and World Peace (www.davidlynchfoundation.org), which raises funds to promote consciousness-based education for children.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Alfred on January 03, 2008

I recommend listening to this in the Audiobooks version. I listened to it on my iPod and it put me in a great place. David Lynch has this great soothing monotone voice that radiates the sincerity and peacefulness of his message. It's sort of like the first time I heard Jimi Hendrix speak...it's like......more

Goodreads review by Thalia on March 01, 2008

I bought this book randomly in an airport bookstore in Japan on my way back from a trip to Thailand. I've always been a fan of David Lynch's tv and film work and had heard that he is into TM and even had started a school about it. I was intrigued. I love this little book. The chapters are short - mo......more

Goodreads review by David on July 26, 2012

This is not a how-to book. It may inspire and motivate, but it won't inform. Lynch briefly describes the benefits of Transcendental Meditation. Not only will it greatly enhance your creativity, but it will also greatly enhance your life. And there the lesson ends. If you meditate, greatly enhanced c......more

Goodreads review by Don on August 12, 2012

David Lynch has always been an inspiration to me. His films, of course, but also his painting, his carpentry, and even his unfilmed scenarios like RONNIE ROCKET and ONE SALIVA BUBBLE are beautiful mysteries waiting to be uncovered. And now, a book. Though Lynch doesn't consider himself much of a writ......more

Goodreads review by Paul on January 27, 2012

I recently finished reading this book "Catching the Big Fish", a very personal account of David Lynch's approach to creativity, and the role that meditation plays in it. I have often felt that techniques like meditation may result in the bland art, due to lack of "pain", Mr Lynch is a very good examp......more

Quotes

“The quirky helmer known for Boy Scout demeanor and twisted tales shares his creative vision in a surprisingly gentle tome informed by the underlying teachings of Transcendental Meditation. But don’t worry: David Lynch, one-time creator of “The Angriest Dog in the World” comic, keeps the proselytizing to a minimum. He addresses topics ranging from working with wood (for it) to director’s commentaries (against) in deceptively simple, yet ultimately affirming, chapters. There’s much for fans and aspiring filmmakers to enjoy.”
—Variety
 
“Ideas are like fish. If you want to catch little fish, you can stay in the shallow water. But if you want to catch the big fish, you've got to go deeper," says David Lynch the idiosyncratic filmmaker whose creations include Eraserhead, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive, Inland Empire, and the cult TV classic, Twin Peaks. He claims that he has savored the pleasures of diving deep thanks to a 33-year practice of Transcendental Meditation (TM). He describes the fun of gathering what he calls "firewood" (all kinds of ideas and things for a film), the joy he takes in seeing an aging building or a rusted bridge, and the respect he has for Fellini and Kubrick. Lynch loves making movies and diving deep, and this testament bears witness to both loves.”
—Spirituality & Practice
 
“In Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity, David Lynch puts aside his filmic quest to get inside the viewer’s head and lets them instead inside his, an invitation almost as rare as a ticket to fiction’s Wonka Chocolate Factory, and possibly just as out of this world. Catching the Big Fish is a blend of thoughts and themes, sometimes random like a stream of consciousness, or — the analogy he personally prefers for creativity — casting a hook into a bottomless sea. The book melds biography, film analysis, philosophy and spirituality with a heart-on-sleeve sincerity, while incorporating a narrative of the author’s passion for charting the world of dreams and ideas and rendering them unto action.”
—BlogCritics
 
“With this book, Lynch offers us a rare glimpse into his own head. In the process, he reveals just enough biographical information, philosophy of film, and general behind-the-scenes dirt (including the connection between Lynch's Lost Highway and O. J. Simpson)to keep the attention of those more interested in Lynch's films than in his consciousness.”
—Booklist

Add to Cart
Add to Wish List