Over the last week or so I’ve re-read Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch and High Fidelity. Hornby certainly writes with great insights about obsessions – his and others, whether it be soccer or music. I had almost forgotten I owned these books and I’m not sure why I picked them up again now. These books reminded of a uni lecturer explaining in no uncertain terms to my wide-eyed first year tutorial group that autobiographical writing was of very little literary worth and was usually undertaken by women! Each to their own opinions I suppose…

What I liked this time with Fever Pitch was that although my knowledge of English soccer (or “football”) is extremely minimal this didn’t prevent me from engaging with it. For me what Hornby is writing about more generally is the business of being a fan – something that most of us can relate to in one area or another. But he’s writing intelligently about other things as well…contemporary masculinity, the changing social and cultural fabric of Britain, gender and family politics. And every time I got to the point of “enough with the navel gazing” he would move away from the detailed self-examination to consider these broader themes. Fever Pitch perhaps does this more successfully than High Fidelity. The strength of High Fidelity, for me at least, is that I can identify with the oh-so-selective and judgemental music fan he portrays. Not that I take myself quite so seriously as these characters… anymore…but I do recall some cringe-inducing moments when I have lectured others about their musical tastes (or lack thereof). I don’t do this now.

Sure they’re not “difficult” reads…but sometimes that’s the best kind of reading.