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Jacqueline du Pré: A Biography Paperback – October 1, 2000
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- Print length232 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- Publication dateOctober 1, 2000
- Dimensions9.1 x 6.12 x 0.6 inches
- ISBN-100306809761
- ISBN-13978-0306809767
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"[A] strong, compelling, and compassionate book." -- Boston Globe
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Product details
- Publisher : Da Capo Press; 1st Da Capo Press ed edition (October 1, 2000)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 232 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0306809761
- ISBN-13 : 978-0306809767
- Item Weight : 11.4 ounces
- Dimensions : 9.1 x 6.12 x 0.6 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #1,526,318 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #8,054 in Composer & Musician Biographies
- #11,914 in Actor & Entertainer Biographies
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Easton met Jacqueline du Pré in 1982, 5 years before Jacqueline died, and saw her often for most of that time. Though Jacqueline’s husband, brother and sister declined to be interviewed for this book, over 100 other acquaintances, including other musicians, neighbors, friends, patrons, psychologists, doctors, pundits and reviewers contributed to this richly detailed and eloquently written biography. Easton chronicles, in detail, du Pré’s years as one of the most accomplished cellists of her times. The work contains full details of some of Jacqueline’s more memorable performances, including dates, venues, orchestras, other performers, as well as the receptions by the audiences. Innumerable quotations from published critques and reviews, along with quotes from some of the many interviews she conducted, were woven seemlessly into the text.
Nearly all of the interviewees who were quoted, spoke eloquently about, and with great admiration for Du Pré, not just for her musicianship, but about her qualities as a person. Though Easton was obviously an admirer of her subject, she doesn’t portray her as a saint. She never hesitated to describe Jacqueline objectively, noting her shortcomings as well. From reading this book, I’m satisfied that I possess a realistic and accurate understanding of who Du Pré was as a person and what her life was about.
Easton readily confesses that she is not an expert on musical theory or the intricacies of various artistic techniques. This biography is not about technicalities, few of which you will find in the text. It is all about Jacqueline du Pré’s life. However, abundant professional reviews of Jacqueline’s performances are provided throughout the book as direct quotations from newspaper reviews or as quotations in interviewees’ own words.
Reviewer’s Mini-biography:
Jacqueline du Pré, who started playing the cello at 4, was immediately recognized as having remarkable talent. By her early teens, she had already begun performing in public at lesser known venues, as a “child prodigy”. In 1961, at the age of 16, she made her London debut at Wigmore Hall, playing a Stradivarius nonetheless, which she received as a gift from a wealthy patron. The audience was overwhelmed by her performance, and by the following morning when reviews appeared in the press, offers for recitals and orchestral engagements began flooding in, and thus her career was launched.
During the following 10 years, she received a flood of invitations to play at countless, prestigious venues, with some of the most prominent orchestras of the world. In 1965, at the age of 20, she toured the United States with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. On Christmas Eve, 1966, she met and played (informally) with Daniel Barenboim for the first time. The two were married 6 months later in Israel, and spent the next 5 years touring the international classical music circuit together and separately. That period in her life proved to be an exhilarating, though quite exhaustive, seemingly uninterrupted sequence of performances, all to great acclaim.
In late 1970, Jacqueline began experiencing fleeting, but nevertheless worrying, intermittent physical impairments: numbness in her fingers, extreme fatigue, mysterious aches and pains – which ultimately proved to be symptoms of the onset of multiple sclerosis (MS). No doubt, the stresses of her high-pressured, hectic career, jet setting from continent to continent, playing concerts on short notice, were taking a toll on her health. The early symptoms were severe enough to prevent her from giving quality performances, and she had to take leave from the concert circuit. As months and years passed, despite medical and psychological treatments, her condition worsened, as the debilitating disease gradually took over her body. She was forced finally to call it quits by 1973. All the while, Barenboim continued with his career, increasingly away from home, staying in touch by phone whenever possible and providing financial support. Confined to her bed and wheelchair in her small London flat for the next 14 years, Jacqueline’s condition progressively worsened, and she succumbed to pneumonia in late 1987, at the young age of 42, a lonely, depressed, disillusioned and heartbroken woman.
Music and the cello weren’t just the loves of Jacqueline’s life, they WERE her life. The cello was her very best friend, to which she turned time and again to relieve stress and seek solace. Both music and her cello were tragically denied her due to the devastating effects of her disease. Worse than that, there were inevitable psychological consequences, such as loneliness, depression, severe loss self-esteem and self-worth. Her immediate family largely abandoned her, in disapproval over her marriage to a Jewish man. Barenboim cared, but was away most of the time, busy with his career. Visits by former colleagues and friends during the last years of her life helped buoy her spirts a bit, as did the occasional honorary degrees she received, and the OBE award (Order of the British Empire), but in the end, they could not begin to compensate for her loss of freedom and a meaningful and rewarding life. Jacqueline du Pré will live on, through her music and Easton's fine biography, in the hearts of those who appreciate fine classical music.
The author Easton met Jacqueline in her last few years but her depiction of those old good days of Jacqueline is very vivid and attractive. I felt like seeing smily girl who had been the unique prodigy who gotten cut off from other normal peers but warm-hearted in person.
Especially the latter part of her life was very impressive to me other than her former one. She chose to carry on against all odds and made it at last. That is alike the cello’s note. we, human beings cannot always enjoy dazzling ups . Someday we all have to admit our mortality and our closing days. Her attitude towards that is very moving. The climax of cello’s tune is receding weeping. After this book I learned the way not to judge one’s life by superficial standard.
I have been keenly into the last sentences in this book.
Music remains.
Top reviews from other countries
musicians struck down by the cruelty of muscular sclerosis. A brave and strong woman born too early and in less informed times.
Will always love you Jacqueline!






