For the Love of It: Amateuring and Its Rivals - Hardcover

Booth, Wayne C.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0226065855 ISBN 13: 9780226065854

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 1999

Synopsis

For the Love of It is a story not only of one intimate struggle between a man and his cello, but also of the larger struggle between a society obsessed with success and individuals who choose challenging hobbies that yield no payoff except the love of it.

"If, in truth, Booth is an amateur player now in his fifth decade of amateuring, he is certainly not an amateur thinker about music and culture. . . . Would that all of us who think and teach and care about music could be so practical and profound at the same time."—Peter Kountz, New York Times Book Review

"[T]his book serves as a running commentary on the nature and depth of this love, and all the connections it has formed in his life. . . . The music, he concludes, has become part of him, and that is worth the price."—Clea Simon, Boston Globe

"The book will be read with delight by every well-meaning amateur who has ever struggled. . . . Even general readers will come away with a valuable lesson for living: Never mind the outcome of a possibly vain pursuit; in the passion that is expended lies the glory."—John von Rhein, Chicago Tribune

"Hooray for amateurs! And huzzahs to Wayne Booth for honoring them as they deserve. For the Love of It celebrates amateurism with genial philosophizing and pointed cultural criticism, as well as with personal reminiscences and self-effacing wit."—James Sloan Allen, USA Today

"Wayne Booth, the prominent American literary critic, has written the only sustained study of the interior experience of musical amateurism in recent years, For the Love of It. [It] succeeds as a meditation on the tension between the centrality of music in Booth's life, both inner and social, and its marginality. . . . It causes the reader to acknowledge the heterogeneity of the pleasures involved in making music; the satisfaction in playing well, the pride one takes in learning a difficult piece or passage or technique, the buzz in one's fingertips and the sense of completeness with the bow when the turn is done just right, the pleasure of playing with others, the comfort of a shared society, the joy of not just hearing, but making, the music, the wonder at the notes lingering in the air."—Times Literary Supplement

About this title

About the Author

Wayne C. Booth (1921–2005) was the George M. Pullman Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus in English Language and Literature at the University of Chicago.  His many books include The Rhetoric of Fiction and For the Love of It: Amateuring and Its Rivals, both published by the University of Chicago Press.

Reviews

This entertaining meditation on the rewards of being an amateur cellist is both a memoir and a philosophical inquiry into the meaning of time and pleasure. The author, a literary scholar and professor emeritus of English at the University of Chicago, began learning to play the cello when he was 31, fully realizing that he would never become a professional. Now in his 70s, Booth details the decades he has spent playing for the sheer love of it and the rewards his commitment has brought him. Although he learned both the clarinet and piano as a child in a musical family, Booth later opted for the cello, in part because he could then accompany his wife, a violinist and viola player, in chamber music concerts with friends. He describes the difficulties, delights and just plain fun he has had in his struggle to play better, with both good and bad teachers as well as patient and impatient amateur chamber musicians. He also recounts how playing became a form of spiritual healing after the death of his son. Booth convincingly argues that amateur activities such as music, painting or scholarly pursuits undertaken for pleasure enrich a driven society too concerned with monetary success.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Veteran literary critic Booth (Univ. of Chicago; The Company We Keep: An Ethics of Fiction, 1988) offers a heartfelt, though somewhat scattered, assertion of the value of avocation. With detailed (sometimes overly detailed) examinations of the many ways that his devotion to chamber music has affected his life and worldview, Booth, who started his lifelong study of the cello in 1952 at the age of 31 (after earlier dalliances with clarinet, piano, and voice), makes a convincing argument for the spiritual, physical, and social benefits of amateuring. The book, an amalgam of ruminations, journal entries, and polemics on and around the topic of why the amateur chooses, day by day, hour by hour, to pursue what life does not require, is in many ways a paean to the composers (most particularly Beethoven) whose music the author adores and to the teachers and fellow amateurs (most particularly his wife, a talented violinist) who have shared with him the pain and joy of this devotion. Booth sometimes veers into a fussy, dogmatic toneon familiar subjects like the evils of passive hobbies or the failure of the school systems to provide a decent musical educationwhich may make readers impatient for the return of his more starry-eyed, crazy-for-the-cello narrative. For the Love of It would benefit from an accompanying soundtrack; it illustrates a bit too perfectly the dichotomy between rhetoric and music, since often the long passages that attempt to describe the rapture of a specific opus fall short of success. Yet Booths struggleboth musical and authorialis so admirable, and his joy in learning so tangible, that many readers will be tempted, as he hopes, to stop reading and get working on [their] own amateur pursuit. An inspiring exhortation to those who have yet to find passion in pastime. (7 b&w illustrations, not seen) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Four decades ago, at age 31, Booth (English, emeritus, Univ. of Chicago) discovered a new love: playing the cello. He became absorbed in the mastery of his instrument and experienced the intoxication known only to the dedicated amateur. While the professional develops his or her craft in part for financial gain, Booth reveals what it is to play solely for joy and personal accomplishment. The cellist's art is full of struggle and frustration, but its rewards are as great as the demands it makes upon Booth and other devotees like him. In this humorous and heartfelt account, he effectively contrasts the perspective of amateur and professional. A well-written book that will appeal to a wide readership; recommended for any library with a music collection.AYan Toma, Queens Borough P.L., Flushing, NY
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0226065855
• ISBN 13: 9780226065854
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 248