Reading: Nick Hornby's High Fidelity

Good read.

Tiny Mix Tapes: "In the Shadow of High Fidelity
The blessing and curse of Nick Hornby's modern classic
01.14.05

by ken napzok

The male mind is a dangerous landscape- dangerous in the sense of how straight ahead and simple it is. It is filled with longing, bravado, and confusion that seem to have not taken too many steps forward since the days of adolescence. It is a straight ahead world, this male mind, and most of the time it has a cool soundtrack. We want love, a sense of purpose, and a good record collection. No one seemed to really capture this for the all the world to read until Nick Hornby released his book High Fidelity in 1995. Five years later, John Cusack and his team released the much heralded movie version. The shadow was cast and we are still under its spell...

(And from the end of the article, a section that hits home.)

At its core, the story of High Fidelity is about a man locked in an immature state of mind. It proves that even in your mid-thirties, you can still have the need to grow up. Hornby's main character does grow up. He realizes his faults. He faces his fear of commitment. He starts to understand that there is a world beyond music, movies, and girls… and the male fantasies revolving around all of them. And he takes a giant step forward in his growth in getting back with his girlfriend. Hornby's masterstroke might be that the reconciliation is not dramatic and remains open-ended. It is based in a reality far from the Hollywood ending. There are no fireworks or passionate kisses. No tearful wedding. It's not clean or perfect. Laura even explains that they are partially back together because she is too tired not to be in the wake of her father's death. Rob proposes marriage and it's denied… for now. But when Rob explains that the important growth point was that he asked, it all makes sense. The story has its ending. The character grew enough to take the important first step. Good point, good moment, great story. The ultimate problem is that, like many things in life, the journey is much better than the destination.

I am in love with the life Rob leads because it is so similar to my life and the lives of countless others, including my friends. I am in love with this romantic notion of the freewheeling, confused, emotional roller coaster ride of the single man. I live it almost by choice, seemingly trapped forever in an immature state of adolescent angst. When I finished reading the book, one of the first thoughts I had was that I wanted to go out and get a girlfriend right away just so I could break up with her. Just so I could have a new story to tell and scar to explain. I wanted the emotional sucker punch of another failed romantic situation just so I could make a good mix CD about it. That's just not healthy. We should always be looking to better ourselves or make risk choices that will lead to personal growth.

Right?

I think so. I believe in my heart that that is part of the point of growing up and getting older. Maturity is a good thing… I think. It leads to more compassion, selflessness, and fulfillment. Nick Hornby tells us that the journey is supposed to take us to the destination. I just can't escape the shadow. I don't want to wake up one day and find my music collection in my "office." Not yet."