There are no shortcuts in the quest for perfection. In Peter Goldsworthy's 1989 bildungsroman novel Maestro, Paul learns this the hard way, through his piano studies. He is motivated by his father, Eduard Keller, his piano teacher, and he himself strives for perfection. He trains intensely with Keller and decides to persist in his quest for perfection even though he is consistently told that "he is talented" "he will become a great musician". For a short period of time he puts popularity over his quest for perfection by joining a rock band. Nevertheless the band's fame wasn't enough to deter Paul from his quest. Paul takes advantage of the bands chance to go to Adelaide to also take part in a piano competition. Later in life his law studies
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Throughout Paul's life he experiences bouts of internal conflict, mainly through his teenage years. When he cheats on Rosie with Megan, the girl of his dreams when he was younger.` Instead of staying with Megan he bikes over to Rosie's trailer as he is "... terrified. Terrified of losing her" and blurts out that he loves her. Another time he was confronted with conflict in his teenage years was when he joins the Rock and Roll band even though he thought it was "Music to shit by". After Rough Stuff won the Battle of Sounds Paul feels "strangely empty, deflated". During his last day in Darwin Paul faces a significant conflict. Staying and listening to Keller's tale vs going off and spending time with his friends. In the end he decides to leave Keller mid-way to go to the end-of-year bonfire. In hindsight he realises that he "should have stayed, listened, poured out his schnapps, lubricated his tongue." Similarly Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken" parallels the concept of gaining wisdom through conflict by portraying a protagonist who has trouble with the choices he has made about his future. The speaker of the poem who is travelling comes to a fork in the road and has to choose one of the paths to follow. This symbolises the journey of life and the decisions we are forced make on our journey. The first line of the poem "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood" tells us that the speaker has to make a decision walk down one of these roads leaving the other behind. This line represents how the speaker could have multiple choices in his life. This allows us as
Throughout Paul's life he experiences bouts of internal conflict, mainly through his teenage years. When he cheats on Rosie with Megan, the girl of his dreams when he was younger.` Instead of staying with Megan he bikes over to Rosie's trailer as he is "... terrified. Terrified of losing her" and blurts out that he loves her. Another time he was confronted with conflict in his teenage years was when he joins the Rock and Roll band even though he thought it was "Music to shit by". After Rough Stuff won the Battle of Sounds Paul feels "strangely empty, deflated". During his last day in Darwin Paul faces a significant conflict. Staying and listening to Keller's tale vs going off and spending time with his friends. In the end he decides to leave Keller mid-way to go to the end-of-year bonfire. In hindsight he realises that he "should have stayed, listened, poured out his schnapps, lubricated his tongue." Similarly Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken" parallels the concept of gaining wisdom through conflict by portraying a protagonist who has trouble with the choices he has made about his future. The speaker of the poem who is travelling comes to a fork in the road and has to choose one of the paths to follow. This symbolises the journey of life and the decisions we are forced make on our journey. The first line of the poem "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood" tells us that the speaker has to make a decision walk down one of these roads leaving the other behind. This line represents how the speaker could have multiple choices in his life. This allows us as