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March 29, 2024, 05:47:23 am

Author Topic: [English] Text Response - Maestro  (Read 2924 times)  Share 

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adelaide.emily10

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[English] Text Response - Maestro
« on: April 23, 2011, 04:26:41 pm »
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Prompt: How does Goldworthy's use of the first person narrative affect our understanding of the characters in Maestro?

Peter Goldsworthy’s Maestro is told in the first person and depicts a much older and wiser Paul Crabbe looking back at his past. The novel is told only in Paul’s perspective and for this reason it limits the reader’s understanding of the events between 1967 and 1977. Furthermore the reader is presented with a set of memoirs that have been processed by the narrator Paul and this clouds the reader’s understanding of characters.  However, the use of the first person narrative allows the reader to connect with Paul and see such characters as three dimensional.

Firstly, as the novel is told from the viewpoint of Paul, the reader only sees the occurring events from a certain view, that being Paul Crabbe’s in Maestro.  The reader is given certain glimpses into Paul’s life and from this must create a somewhat mental jigsaw to judge the occurrences from 1967 to 1977. Paul in 1967 and 1968 is still developing and is ‘entering the world of the senses’; Megan is presented to the reader as Paul’s crush and her beauty is amplified to the reader, Rosie on the other hand is shown to the reader as ‘not attractive’ and ‘very similar’ to Paul. This highlights that the reader does not see both girls as they are but from the perspective of a 15 year old boy who is ‘sexually awakening’ in the ‘steamy hothouse of Darwin’. However, it becomes apparent that Megan is a foil to Rosie, Paul later on realises that Megan is ‘shallow’ and that the ‘sum of all that beauty was somehow less than its parts.’ This teaches Paul about love and lust but also informs the reader that although Rosie lacked the ‘halo’ like appearance that Megan possessed , she had substance as a character.   Moreover, Eduard Keller is initially portrayed as a ‘Nazi’ with a ‘boozer’s incandescent glow’, this seemingly negative representation of Keller has some impact on the reader’s initial judgement of Keller. This use of vivid imagery underlines that Keller initially is not presented to the reader as the ‘Maestro’, a term Paul later says ‘seemed somehow natural’, but is depicted from the viewpoint of an ‘insensitive’ and ‘spoilt’ adolescence who ‘basked’ in ‘murmurs of praise’ from his parents.  Furthermore, the reader is exposed to a limited view of the relationship between John and Nancy Crabbe. Paul only sees the ‘surface’ of the relationship between his parents and concludes that their marriage was ‘like a gentle war’. He compares and contrasts them ‘like the notes on a piano’. The reader is rendered a ‘simple’ account of Paul’s parents and is limited to only what Paul sees and like Paul is unaware of what happened ‘behind closed doors’.  Therefore, this limitation means that the reader does not have in depth understanding of certain characters and is exposed to characters and events from one viewpoint.

The use of the first person narration by Paul allows the reader to develop a connection with the protagonist. The reader is given a valuable insight into Paul’s life and this enables the reader to not only understand his thought processes but also grow and develop with him as he matures from an ‘arrogant’ teenager to a ‘dissatisfied’ young man. The older Paul informs the reader of his regrets about his past. One such occasion is his betrayal of Bennie Reid, Paul ‘immediately regret(s)’  ‘dobbing’ Bennie into his so called ‘friend’ Jimmy but only the reader knows about how long after the incident Paul wishes he could ‘turn back the clock’.  This insight allows the reader to be somewhat sympathetic to Paul and understand his regrets as a wiser counterpart of himself with the advantage of hindsight.  In addition, Paul on the surface aspires to be a concert pianist and this is made clearly evident however, the reader also learns that Paul is to some extent is pressured into this aspiration. Paul’s father tells Paul that he will be ‘better than (him)’, but Paul informs the reader that this was ‘an order’ from his father rather than a word of confidence.  Furthermore, the reader is able to connect with Paul and this creates him into a more life-like character. The reader is exposed to every thought and emotion Paul feels, when Paul immaturely cries after a piano lesson the reader sees how vulnerable Paul is and although he may seem arrogant and strong willed on the surface, he is also sensitive especially to Keller ‘harsh’ criticism.  However, this is rectified when Keller admits that he has treated Paul with a ‘father’s hardness’, again a valuable insight into the relationship between Paul and Keller. In addition, the reader’s understanding of Keller deepens through the narrator Paul. Initially the reader’s ‘first impressions’ of Keller are fairly negative however, as the novel progresses the reader is able to understand Keller’s ‘eccentric’ behaviour particularly during the Wagner item at the music program.  Therefore the first person narrative provides a valuable insight into the lives of characters and increases the reader’s depth of understanding of such characters.

In conclusion, the first person narrative has its strengths and weaknesses that affect the reader’s understanding of character in Maestro. A limitation of the first person narrative presented by Paul Crabbe as a set of memoirs is that the reader is exposed to a limited viewpoint of the events presented. However, the in-depth insight into lives of characters through the protagonist Paul is a valuable asset to Goldsworthy’s Maestro.

word count: 908 - i know quite short for a text response :(