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    Manhood for Amateurs
    Manhood for Amateurs
    Manhood for Amateurs
    Audiobook8 hours

    Manhood for Amateurs

    Written by Michael Chabon

    Narrated by Michael Chabon

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    “Chabon has always been a magical prose stylist, adept at combining the sort of social and emotional detail found in Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus stories with the metaphor-rich descriptions of John Updike and John Irving’s inventive sleight of hand. . . . As in his novels, he shifts gears easily between the comic and the melancholy, the whimsical and the serious, demonstrating once again his ability to write about the big subjects of love and memory and regret without falling prey to the Scylla and Charybdis of cynicism and sentimentality.”
    — Michiko Kakutani, New York Times

    “Wondrous, wise and beautiful.”
    — David Kamp, New York Times Book Review

    The bestselling and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Werewolves in Their Youth, Wonderboys, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, and The Yiddish Policemen’s Union Michael Chabon “takes [his] brutally observant, unfailingly honest, marvelously human gaze and turns it on his own life” (Time) in the New York Times bestselling memoir Manhood for Amateurs.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateOct 6, 2009
    ISBN9780061966545
    Manhood for Amateurs
    Author

    Michael Chabon

    Michael Chabon is the bestselling and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Moonglow and The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, among many others. He lives in Berkeley, California with his wife, the novelist Ayelet Waldman, and their children.

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    Reviews for Manhood for Amateurs

    4/5

    374 ratings42 reviews

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    • 4/5
      "Manhood for Amateurs" is a collection of beautifully-written, autobiographical essays by Michael Chabon. Like its title, the book is separated into multiple wittily-named sections (e.g. Exercises in Masculine Affection) and covers topics from growing up in the wild to being a father. On the whole, most essays are short yet all manage to end with a satisfying thud.Having read his fiction, Chabon surprised me with the amount of reflective grace embedded within each of these essays. Not only are they peppered with his insights about the world, but they almost always end with a particular point or conclusion. However, its conclusion-heavy nature became a little old midway through the book as every anecdote ended with a pretty moral. Or perhaps it's that the end of the first half also marked the end of his first set of essays on fatherhood, which I found brilliant.Read if: The title appeals to your sense of humor.Avoid if: You're looking for drama.
    • 5/5
      Most of these short essays were written for Details, a men's clothing and lifestyle magazine. That audience allows Chabon terrific range -- in a single paragraph he can roam back and forth from coarse to erudite. Reading these essays is like sitting at ease with a guy who is a close enough friend to be emotionally open, in an environment sufficiently informal that he can say exactly what he means, without circumlocutions or euphemisms. But of course they're essays, so that mood is the product not of actual intimacy, but of skilled and careful writing, however effortless it seems. Shining through all the essays is Chabon's astoundingly precise word choice, which lets the meaning of a paragraph - or an entire essay - pivot on a single phrase. An example of that precision is the book's title, which sounds self-deprecating at first take, but in light of the penultimate essay ('The Amateur Family'), has a different, much richer significance: "The closest I have ever come [to defining the kind of people I have raised my children to be] is amateur, in all the original best senses of the word: a lover, a devotee; a person driven by passion and obsession to do it -- to explore the imaginary world - oneself."The essays in the collection I found most moving include 'The Hand on My Shoulder', about Chabon's relationship with the father of his ex-wife; 'The Heartbreak Kid', which knits together mirth and self-inflicted suffering; 'A Woman of Valor', in praise of Chabon's wife; 'Xmas', a Jewish take on Christmas; and 'Daughter of the Commandment', on time and family, and which brought a lump to my throat, not that I'm particularly sentimental.
    • 1/5
      The opening chapters were great, but then the book degraded into navel-gazing about the author's fascination with comic book superheroes, which he was not really able to make interesting for other people, like me, who is not into that. Its a pity because I was planning to read The Mysteries of Pittsburgh before, but after this first encounter with Michael Chabon I am no longer so keen on reading The Mysteries. My loss, I suspect though.
    • 2/5
      I just cannot relate to this guy as a human being. Maybe this book is great, I don't really know.
    • 4/5
      Reliably funny, occasionally hilarious, sometimes painful to read. His descriptions of his kids, and of his interactions with them, are delightful.
    • 5/5
      This is a delightful collection of essays ruminating on both childhood and adulthood and the various roles we play in others' lives. Chabon is particularly wonderful at evoking the magic and wonder of childhood, and several of the essays detail incidents from his growing up. He is also very funny, as in the excellent "I Feel Good About My Murse," as well as deeply thoughtful as in the moving "Xmas." Dealing with a wide array of subjects, from circumcision to cooking to Legos, Chabon is a wonderful chronicler of his own life and makes unexpected connections to his readers' lives along the way.I would also note that the audio is read by Chabon himself, and is very, very good.
    • 5/5
      I don't like that description, referencing 'hectic' and 'divorces' etc, very much. This book does have adult material, but it's handled with calm courage and grace, and plenty of humor (muchly of the self-deprecating kind). And, mostly, the issues and ideas he explores are universal - even Gentile Women will feel not just sympathy, but empathy. Moreover, he has that special way with words that makes him popular among critics and Literary folk, but also accessible to ordinary readers like me.

      One example of the humor, this time not self-deprecating but compassionate, about a woman at the grocery store who looked fondly at the author & the author's litte son. She had on rainbow leggings, and I thought she might be a little bit crazy and therefore fond of everyone."

      One warning - the author is an agnostic 'bacon-eating' Jew, who lives in Berkeley and hates GW Bush. So, if you're not fond of those kinds of people, you might feel a bit alienated at times.

      I admit I'm having trouble deciding whether to encourage you to read this. I do think it's wonderful. I'd push it on my son if he were grown, but at 15 I don't think he's ready. I can't see my husband or dad or brother reading it. And yet, I do want to emphasize that I enjoyed it *a lot* and suspect you would too, if you're ok with the genre and with what I said in the first paragraph. Ok."
    • 3/5
      This book collects together essays by author Michael Chabon about being a husband, father, and son.  Particularly his efforts to avoid the cliches of masculinity in these roles.  I can relate to his sensitive and introspective thoughts on fatherhood.  One particularly interesting essay discusses the loss of wildness in childhood (much like the concerns of Free Range Kids' Lenore Skenazy).  This goes beyond children being able to wander around outside though as Chabon discusses how fart jokes in children's books and movies have allowed adults to gentrify what once was a means for children to rebel against the grown-up world.  Other essays are less relatable such as the uncomfortable reminiscences of his early sexual encounters with much older women.  The essays are good and bad, but the good outnumber the bad and they all offer something worth reading.Favorite Passages:"A father is a man who fails every day.""Make all families are a kind of fandom, an endlessly elaborated, endlessly disputed, endlessly reconfigured set of commentaries, extrapolations, and variations generated by passionate amateurs on the primal text of the parents’ love for each other. Sometimes the original program is canceled by death or separation; sometimes, as with Doctor Who, it endures and flourishes for decades. And maybe love, mortality, and loss, and all the children and mythologies and sorrows they engender, make passionate amateurs–nerds, geeks, and fanboys–of us all."Recommended books:
    • 5/5
      Unexpectedly (because of the graphic book connection, & I don'[t like graphic books), I just love this guy! And listening to him read was a bonus.
    • 3/5
      fun and thoughtful
    • 4/5
      I listened to the audio book read by the author. There's something very boyish about his voice that really resonates in the reading. I felt like this was a love story to his generation - my generation - as much as a love story to his family. Sure, he has his gripes, things are not as cool as when WE were kids, yadda yadda... but there's way more joy than curmudgeon in him. I found it a thoroughly enjoyable collection of essays on a modern family.
    • 2/5
      I was completely and utterly disappointed by this collection. I greatly enjoy Chabon's writing with Kavalier and Yiddish Policemen's two of my favorite novels. I also greatly enjoy essays. However, I had forgotten a lesson I learned long ago; the combined attraction of a favored author writing essays does not always result in a pleasing experience.What goes wrong here?Well, that is a hard one to put a finger on. (If we could figure out the answers to all failures, none of us would ever have to fail, right?) One thing I feel is that these essays are far too aware of themselves. Most come from one source and it is as if the author became more and more aware that he had an agenda – the attempt to lightheartedly be the butt of jokes about the foibles of manhood. And, here is problem number two. Yes the book contains the title manhood, but it is much more about fatherhood. (Face it, how can any author separate the two.) And, with that emphasis, the pieces constantly struggle with the temptation to fall into the territory of maudlin writing.Oh, they are written well enough. But under the precept that brevity can contain great depth, they skim over subjects, lightheartedly pretending that they mean much more. What results is the picture of an author with foibles that match our own, but an author who just looks back at them over his shoulder and laughs, "Well, ha-ha, I guess there's nothing we can do" and travels blithely on.Rereading the above, I believe I've come on too heavy handed – the critic who enjoys the task of vilifying while the positive qualities are forgotten. There are some decent essays in the collection. And they show the depth that Chabon has exhibited in his longer writings. And some of that depth speaks to remorse and joy in life. And there's the thing; that's what I wanted in all these essays. But for a few instanced, I did not get that. And that is the root of my disappointment.
    • 2/5
      He still writes delightfuly but I'd much rather a new novel than these essays & memoirs - they're mostly quite dull.
    • 4/5
      The good; He’s a really good writer, funny, interesting, and has some good insights. His language can be on the clever side, but never hard to read or obtuse. Overall a good read.

      The bad; a little too much "I’m an Enlightened Male". A lot of his thoughts are about being a parent and I’m just not that interested. Not enough to put me off.

      Except…he has a couple of essays about children today (including his own) and how they’re too sheltered, and not allowed to get into their own trouble enough. It’s an opinion I share, and I’ve never heard it put better, all sides of it.
    • 4/5
      It was a great pleasure to read this book. There were such a lot of déjà vu for me. All those funny little experiences with own children which I've remembered could be really identically to the authors one. The only differences are that in my country children are still able to play out in the neighbourhood without any parental survey as well the cycling on the roads is still possible here. It was a marvellous and humorously reading.
    • 5/5
      I have been and always will be a sucker for any kind of how-to manual for the human race that anyone wants to put on a bookshelf. The fact that Chabon is one of my favorite authors is just icing on the cake.

      The sad truth of the matter, of course, is that these books never live up to their billing. At best, one is left with a particularly obscure set of ikea-like illustrations, suggesting that while there is some particular road upon which one can tread, finding it will require luck more than words.

      But although Chabon's book does little to explain "manhood" to the rest of us amateurs, it was still a great read. Even though he comes off as far more of a superdad than I suspect he actually is, his honest acknowledgment of his flaws in the other areas of his life give the book a groundedness that makes it both accessible and entertaining.
    • 4/5
      A very enjoyable collection of Michael Chabon's various essays throughout the years, loosely organized into chapters about different stages of his life. I am big fan of Chabon and I credit him with injecting recent mainstream American fiction with a shot of respectable geekiness. Reading these essays also helps one understand a little of Chabon's background and the impetus for many of the themes found in his novels. I started reading this with Amber in the early morning hours while we were hanging out with Sebastian in the NICU before I had to go to work. We had been reading various books on parenting or childhood. Our routine of reading aloud to each other soon became hampered however when we came to Chabon's nostalgic stories regarding his adolescence. I won't go into the subject matter but let's just say they shouldn't be read out loud in the presence of polite company, such as the tender ears of the NICU nurses. That's not to say they aren't highly entertaining and full of proverbial and familial insight. Although Chabon is a good decade older than me, his way of describing the hallmarks of childhood is eerily similar to my memories. For example, there is a great essay on the differences between what I was allowed to do when I was a child (ride bikes around the neighborhood, build tree forts in the distant woods, roam the streets of the Kimberlin subdivision for hours with other kids) and how that freedom and risk is rarely tolerated by modern parents. The paranoia of kidnapping, the fear of unfettered freedom and of unsupervised exploration has overwhelmingly trumped the practice of letting kids just go outside to play in the woods for most of the day. Now there are the endless lessons, activities, and play dates arranged and structured throughout the week. Chabon laments the disappearance of this freedom but also admits that he can barely manage to let his own kids out of his sight. Now that I have a very young child in my life, I sympathize with the dilemma. Has rates of kidnapping gone up since the 80's? No, of course not, but the emphasis on the possibility has. The blame for something like that happening falls more on the parents now, not the kidnapper.Chabon also shares some humorous stories about making friends, sustaining romantic relationships, his parents, marriage, divorce, being Jewish, fatherhood vs. motherhood, and so on. Many of the subjects are mixed together. He has an essay on trying to explain the concept of feminism to his young sons while drawing super hero characters. The boys are having trouble drawing super heroines and Chabon is in the difficult position of describing exactly how women are physically different which leads into a contemplation of how super heroines are different from their male counterparts on an emotional level. There is another story about explaining to his young children about drug use and whether or not to lie to them regarding his own drug use as a teenager in the 70's. There is seven page lament for the evolution of Lego. Again, well written and funny. Ultimately, if you like Chabon's novels, you will probably enjoy this collection, especially if you are a geeky parent. If you are unfamiliar with Chabon, than you may still enjoy this series of essays but I highly recommend you read his novels eventually.
    • 4/5
      A non-linear memoir told in vignettes, funny, self-deprecating, nerdy, engaging.
    • 5/5
      I don't usually read memoirs and didn't know what to expect when I picked up Manhood for Amateurs (aside from having read and enjoyed The Yiddish Policeman's Union), but I was pleasantly surprised by how fun of a read this was. Chabon describes his life in a style that's vivid and has just the right amount of wit, and I was amazed at how much I felt I could relate to his essays despite the generation gap between us. And I might have even learned a thing or two.I was planning to list my favorite essays, but I don't think I can: there are simply too many to list.
    • 5/5
      While I was already a fairly big fan of Chabon, I was very pleasantly surprised by this collection of essays on fatherhood, masculinity, and generally speaking life that made me laugh, cry, and ponder the world. His nostalgia is contagious and makes for a highly entertaining, informative, and thought provoking read.
    • 4/5
      As I began Michael Chabon’s Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Father, Husband, and Son, I was under the impression that the book was simply a collection of essays on what it means to be a family man in the midst of all of today’s craziness. But it is so much more than that. Chabon does give his thoughts on parenting and on being a man burdened with a certain amount of insecurity about his role, but because of all the personal history the author uses to illustrate his points, the book can just as easily be classified as an autobiography or memoir.Divided into ten sections of 1-6 pieces each, Manhood for Amateurs visits various phases of Chabon’s life, beginning with his boyhood and progressing to his relationship with his wife and children in the present (2009). Along the way, Chabon reveals a truth known to most men, if they will only admit it to themselves: they are largely faking it. In fact, the first piece under the section entitled “Styles of Manhood” is called exactly that, “Faking It.” Here, Chabon addresses the male tendency to “put up a front,” to “pretend” to possess a competence in any given area that may, or may not, exist. The piece begins with his effort to hang a new towel rack in one of his bathrooms, a task during which Chabon says he “managed to sustain the appearance of competence over nearly the entire course of…three hours.” He, however, well knew from experience that “dealing with molly bolts” often leads to “tragedy.” That it did not happen that way this time, surprised him as much as it did his wife. Another recurring theme of Manhood for Amateurs is the degree of freedom Chabon enjoyed during his childhood compared to how little freedom today’s children experience. Chabon considers the members of his generation to be among the very last children allowed to explore the “Wilderness of Childhood” on their own. This land, once “ruled by children,” a place where they could spend hours at a time free from adult supervision, has disappeared from a world in which every childhood activity seems to be strictly supervised and regulated by parents. Chabon explores how this change affects today’s children, and society, for the rest of their lives.Manhood for Amateurs is filled with frank and insightful writing. It is a pleasure to read Chabon’s prose and to learn so much about the man responsible for books such as The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Wonder Boys, and The Mysteries of Pittsburgh. Chabon has a way of gently exposing the little boy in all of us that is sure to make men everywhere smile in recognition.Rated at: 4.0
    • 5/5
      This review is for the unabridged CD version of the book, read by the author. Manhood for Amateurs is the most delightful, insightful work of non-fiction I’ve read in years. A series of essays drawing from Michael Chabon’s experiences, it chronicles his efforts to be a competent husband, father, and man. Chabon appears to possess one of the most valuable attributes for a writer, a memory for detail. Either that or he kept diaries since he was ten. His anecdotes are fully true-to-life descriptions of incidents that are sometimes joyful, but often painful. His narration is so conversational that playing the CD’s as I drove about town was like a very witty friend telling me his life story. One can never be sure about such things, but I didn’t sense a bit of deception (self- or otherwise) or ego while I listened. Chabon is a generation younger than I am, but I found a good deal to identify with in his experiences. This is one work that I would definitely opt for the CD version if you can do so.
    • 2/5
      Often had an overwrought style, both in terms of vocabulary and analysis of his topics. Mostly just "too much," even when I understood and agreed with the point he was making. Stopped reading at page 58.
    • 5/5
      Witty erudite writing, slightly tarnished by a tiny but discernable smugness. I found myself completely agreeing with him about the fear of strangers destroying a child's ability to explore the outside world alone (or with friends). There's very little of Chabon's work that I won't read. This didn't disappoint.
    • 4/5
      Although Chabon's fairly constant mentioning of his political/religious ideas, which certainly do not align with mine, slightly ruffled my feathers, I really enjoyed this book. I loved his views on men meeting the woman they will spend the rest of their life with and how that affects friendships, responsibility, etc. I also loved his stories concerning divorce and his children talking about the Beatles was adorable.
    • 3/5
      It was...OK. I know people really, really like this author, this GUY, but he just strikes me as yet another egocentric writer whose essays revolve around him and his take on life, his concerns, his mistakes and triumphs. Two essays of note for me were the one on the "murse", in which he realizes just how practical a bag of some sort is, and so he enlists the aid of a friend to find him a proper bag that, well, is masculine enough. The other essay, "The Wilderness of Childhood", was thought-provoking. Chabon discusses his own childhood spent exploring the green space behind his house, riding his bike around the neighborhood, and roaming freely with his friends, then bemoans the fact that his own children appear to be uninterested in doing the same...for whatever reason. Is it the fault of adults, who have become over-protective of their kids? Is it society in general that has decided that the world of a child must be regimented? I believe that each generation bemoans the fact their children won't experience the same childhood they had. In some cases, that is a good thing.
    • 4/5
      If I were just ten or fifteen years younger I'd probably have given this book 5 stars (vs the 4 I assigned). Because the truth is this guy is so hip and knowledgeable about all things related to pop culture of the past thirty years or so, that, quite frankly, there are references here I probably didn't "get" at all. I probably could have researched some of this stuff online, but I didn't, so I stayed uncomfortably in the dark here and there. And I was okay with that, honest. I have only read one other Michael Chabon book, his first novel, Mysteries of Pittsburgh - probably 15 or 20 years ago, and I really enjoyed it. Of course, I was younger then. The thing is, I seem to have gotten so much older since then; Chabon has only aged at about half-speed while I was full-speed ahead. Or so it seemed as I was reading these lovely essays. And they really are wonderful examples of writing - wise, witty, funny, moving and just plain GOOD, ya know? But what impressed me the most were the things he had to say about his mom and dad, who divorced when the author was only 11 or 12, and yet he still has such loving things to say about both of them, and how much he owes to them. So many children of divorce tend to whine about how awful it was for them and blame all their problems on them. Not Chabon. He figures he owes his slight OCD tendencies to his dad, who was a collector and a man of eclectic and idiosyncratic interests. Now Chabon is that kind of man, and is passing the excitement of such interests along to his own children. He even appreciates his mom's ex-boyfriends, who filled certain voids for him while they were around. He credits his mom with turning him into something of a cook and baker, because she was working, and left him to feed the family. There's other stuff like that in here, but the thing is he so obviously STILL LOVES his mom and dad. His brother, five years younger, also gets some print here. Same thing. The guys seem to genuinely LOVE each other. He even has kind things to say about his first wife and his first father-in-law. This is a guy who confesses to being perhaps too much of an optimist for most of his life, who is made content and happy by simple things. How can you not like a guy like this. His devotion to his wife and four children shine through almost everything he says about them in these pieces, though he is brutally honest about how they all function - or don't - as a family.I am a person who reads encyclopedically and in great volume. For the first 50 years or so of my reading life I read mostly fiction. Now I read a bit more non-fiction, mostly memoirs. This book, Manhood for Amateurs, is probably about as close as you'll get to a memoir by Chabon. And maybe it's enough. What a talent this guy has!In one essay, "I Feel Good About My Murse," it hit me why I like this guy and his writing so much. He talks about wishing for a bag to carry his stuff in and finally getting one, a man-purse, or 'murse.' "It holds my essential stuff, including a book - for true contentment, one must carry a book at all times ..." There it is. Chabon loves books. Me too. Now I know I'm gonna have to start reading his other novels. I know my son has the one that won the Pulitzer, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. I'll start with that one. Or maybe first I'll try his other collection of essays - the one about books and writing, called Maps and Legends. Damn! My to-read list just keeps growing. Ain't life grand?
    • 2/5
      I just could not get into this book, sorry.
    • 4/5
      Michael Chabon, dear thing, was in the grocery store one day with a baby and a toddler. He was, and I want to emphasize this, SHOPPING. Just like mothers do every day of the week. But Chabon is a father, not a mother, so when he got to the checkout, a completely strange woman stopped him to say, "I can tell you're a really good father." Chabon says, (and I paraphrase), "What would a mother have to do to earn this unsolicited praise? Perform an emergency tracheotomy with a ballpoint pen?" Bless his heart. Already I love him. This series of essays cover a number of topics: parenting, relationships, fatherhood, man purses. I found the essay about his former father-in-law, "The Hand on My Shoulder," particularly poignant, but Chabon writes with insight and tenderness about many aspects of manhood; each essay has something worthwhile to harvest. I should note that Chabon is married to writer Ayelet Waldman, author of Bad Mother, and it is delightful to read the two books together; their tenderness and admiration for each other simply shines.
    • 3/5
      By turns interesting and enlightening, and then occasionally quite pretentiously irritating. The jury's out on this one until I finish the whole thing.