Peter Goldsworth Novella Maestro

"Maestro is a novell about adolescence and growing up." Do you agree"

Peter Goldsworth novella Maestro is based on adolescence and growing up. Keller (Maestro) educates Paul about the basis of life through music metaphors and Paul learns of other cultures and lives through Keller's experiences in Vienna. The book follows Paul from early adolescence into adulthood and depicts Paul learning and understanding about life.

Paul Crabbe's music lessons in Maestro with Keller do not only teach Paul the essence of music; they tutor him in the fundamentals of life. For Maestro, the grand piano is his sanctity and security, assisting him to deal with the horrors of the world; "safe beneath that grand piano," and likewise offering Eduard a method of destructing life. "Never trust the beautiful ... beauty simplifies" quotes Keller referring to music, also relating to the world. Goldsworth typifies beauty as a facade, a means of avoiding reality, depicted by Paul's discovery of true love in Rosie, whom he initially dismissed as "podgy baby-fat" and

"mousy" as he lusted after Megan. As Peter matures, Maestros phrasings, which seemed absurd in adolescence hardened into a "musical bible whose texts I knew by heart" but Paul does not relate them to his life until middle-age, leaving him "smug, insufferable," throughout his life.

Keller originates from Vienna, where he was a renowned musician "becoming so visible so that nothing can touch him", therefore believing he is exempt from the effects of war. Eventually he lost his wife and son and disappeared from the country, leaving every-one to believe he was dead. Filled with remorse and regret Keller transforms and evolves to become a completely different man, "if we are discussing the same man how different our two versions." Keller understands the frivolities and foolish nature of human's society, passed onto Paul in the form of clippings from newspapers, Keller's "textbooks." "The thousands of stories of human foolishness and greed and cruelty that he had tried to patch together into some kind of understanding of his fellow beings" depicts Keller's knowledge.

When Paul initially began lessons with Maestro his first impressions were misleading, "a boozers incandescent glow", "I'd seen nothing like him before." As Paul matures his attitudes towards Maestro become warmer and they develop an unexpressed bond. "I slipped my arm beneath his head and kissed him" represent Paul's final realisation of his connection with Maestro in death. Throughout his life Paul took Maestro for granted, believing his advice was "irritating - and also contradictory." After Eduard's death Paul realises the opportunities Keller

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