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5th out of 427 books
—
351 voters
Fever Pitch
by
Nick Hornby
In America, it is soccer. But in Great Britain, it is the real football. No pads, no prayers, no prisoners. And that's before the players even take the field.
Nick Hornby has been a football fan since the moment he was conceived. Call it predestiny. Or call it preschool. Fever Pitch is his tribute to a lifelong obsession. Part autobiography, part comedy, part incisive analy
...morePaperback, 256 pages
Published
March 1st 1998
by Riverhead Trade
(first published 1992)
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This is a complicated book. On the one hand it is an obscure, detail-riddled rant about the shortcomings of one man and his obsession with a British football (soccer) team, one which I have a hard time thinking anyone but an Arsenal fan would enjoy. On the other hand, it just might be the greatest sports book ever written, one that might help those who don't understand sports understand how and why certain people they love can care so much about a bunch of grown men running around chasing after...more
May 14, 2011
Stephan van der Linde
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
literature
Even though this book is about a football-club I like (Arsenal), Hornby describes the years 1968 till 1991. In those years Arsenal had not the name and fame it has now.
Hornby, a big "Gunners"-fan visited as child his first Arsenal-game and never skipped a game since.
Hornby describes all the highlights en disappointments through the years.
While reading you start to understand his love for Arsenal.
I think the first 100 pages are kind of boring and the second part is better, but this book is serio...more
Hornby, a big "Gunners"-fan visited as child his first Arsenal-game and never skipped a game since.
Hornby describes all the highlights en disappointments through the years.
While reading you start to understand his love for Arsenal.
I think the first 100 pages are kind of boring and the second part is better, but this book is serio...more
First Hornby I've read--managed to avoid the brief college craze after High Fidelity came out...but now wish I hadn't.
My roommate lent me this book after it came up randomly in a conversation...as I approach 30 and sports fandom becomes more ridiculous proportional to my age, I find myself having to defend my enthusiasm for baseball more and more. Being in Europe probably has something to do with this too. In fact, discussing my love of baseball generally turns into an argument for/against the l...more
My roommate lent me this book after it came up randomly in a conversation...as I approach 30 and sports fandom becomes more ridiculous proportional to my age, I find myself having to defend my enthusiasm for baseball more and more. Being in Europe probably has something to do with this too. In fact, discussing my love of baseball generally turns into an argument for/against the l...more
8 likes · like · see review
Sep 22, 2009
P.Sannie
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
soccer fans, people who know soccer but are obsessed with something else
Fever Pitch is laugh out loud funny. I found myself laughing aloud in my living room, on the train, waiting for public transportation. It is a story not only about soccer (football, sorry), but about fandom, passion, and the relationships that go with it.
Nick Hornby details his relationship to the English football team Arsenal F.C. and yes, it's helpful if you know a little about the sport, otherwise you'd be a bit lost. However, his obsession with the team and sport is applicable to other obse...more
Nick Hornby details his relationship to the English football team Arsenal F.C. and yes, it's helpful if you know a little about the sport, otherwise you'd be a bit lost. However, his obsession with the team and sport is applicable to other obse...more
I love this book more than I can express. I read it for the first time after a particularly painful baseball season (Mariners expelled from the playoffs by demonic Yankees) and I've probably read it every year since. I'm actually reading it again right now because I am painfully baseball deprived until spring training.
Now I realize that it is not actually about baseball specifically- and please, never speak to me about the Americanized movie starring Jimmy Fallon because I will cry and shriek-...more
Now I realize that it is not actually about baseball specifically- and please, never speak to me about the Americanized movie starring Jimmy Fallon because I will cry and shriek-...more
5 likes · like · see review
It was almost too perfect that I chose to read Nick Hornby’s wonderful and engrossing football fan memoir Fever Pitch during World Cup month. Of course, it’s more than a football book, but I was really drawn to his frank admission of the very depths of his football obesession at the same time that the World Cup was reminding me how much fun and how intense it is to watch real top flight soccer.
The writing is great. I can’t say much more about that. His good rep is well-deserved and I feel that...more
The writing is great. I can’t say much more about that. His good rep is well-deserved and I feel that...more
4 likes · like · see review
I am a huge Nick Hornby fan. I love his sense of humor and get a warm cozy feeling whenever I read his writing. So, I decided to pick up this book, which is a bit of a memoir focused on Hornby's obsession with football (or soccer, depending on the country). This was like a sports version of The Orchid Thief. I am not a fan of soccer, don't know the players or the teams. Yet, I enjoyed this book. Sometimes he gets a little heavy on the game details, but he tells enough stories about his childhood...more
It's not just a game. Not to millions of people (a few of whom may be female), it's not. Football is an obsession, and here Nick Hornby's obsession with obsessive males is further indulged. Football turns some of us into crazed lunatics - not mad enough to beat the crap out of someone else just because they like another team, but mad enough to assume that the rest of world does actually stop on Saturday afternoon when the team are at home. Hornby's semi-autobiographical account of being an Arsen...more
Mar 07, 2013
Carlos
added it
The Book Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby was actually not a bad book it's an autobiography of his own life and being an Arsenal fan. Arsenal is a european soccer team that revovled around Nick's life and put him in situations that he might have not been faced with if not for his devotion as an Arsenal fan.
It all starts in 1968 Nick Hornby's parents have just gone through a gruesome divorce which must have been hard for him.Considering his dad felt bad and was sorry for putting the narrator though th...more
It all starts in 1968 Nick Hornby's parents have just gone through a gruesome divorce which must have been hard for him.Considering his dad felt bad and was sorry for putting the narrator though th...more
Like any good book, this volume can be read on many different levels. To begin with, if you are a fan of Nick Hornby's novels (About a Boy, High Fidelity), this can be read as a memoir of his early life as he developed from a child of divorce, to a confused and depressed young man, to finally an assured adult who decides to follow his dream and become a writer. It just so happens that all the important events in his life are framed by Arsenal football matches, which is understandable since one o...more
The two Nick Hornby books most people are familiar with – High Fidelity and About a Boy – focus on the lives of two different thirtysomethings traveling the same meaningless path to nowhere. And, though I’m not 30 yet, I understand that I will be there soon enough, and quite possibly could pass Will Freeman and Rob Fleming on my way down said meaningless path.
Fever Pitch wasn't what I expected, based on those other two Hornby novels I've read. The book isn’t broken into chapters; instead, it is...more
Fever Pitch wasn't what I expected, based on those other two Hornby novels I've read. The book isn’t broken into chapters; instead, it is...more
In't kort: Nick Hornby is een achtjarige knul wanneer zijn vader hem eerder toevallig voor het eerst meeneemt naar een wedstrijd van Arsenal. En dat is het begin van een snel ontluikende liefde, later evoluerend naar een ware obsessie. Hornby staat op met Arsenal en gaat ermee slapen, hij krijgt er klappen om, laat er vriendinnetjes voor in de steek en is bij elk belangrijk verlies opnieuw totaal verloren. Maar de grote zeges worden uiteraard ook passend gevierd. Het boek eindigt 30 jaar na het...more
Otra reseña más. Este libro lo empecé a leer antes que los 2 que terminé antes [1 y 2], ya que hice un paréntesis. La verdad, es que no me gusta casi nada el fútbol y este libro es 100% para hinchas. Sin embargo, después de leer "Alta fidelidad" de este mismo autor y ver la película que se supone que está basada en este libro de "Fiebre en las gradas", me animé un poco, pero me equivoqué. El libro no se parece nada a la película ni hay nada del humor sobre las relaciones de pareja de otro libro....more
Out of all Nick Hornby's books that I have read, this has to be my favourite. I enjoyed About A Boy but I had already seen the film, although I found the book very amusing. I wasn't so keen on Juliet Naked, How To Be Good or High Fidelity, even though I have seen the film of the latter which didn't grab me either.
I did watch Fever Pitch starring Colin Firth (not his best film, in my opinion) but the book is far superior. I was quite surprised because I am not a football fan. What the book did w...more
I did watch Fever Pitch starring Colin Firth (not his best film, in my opinion) but the book is far superior. I was quite surprised because I am not a football fan. What the book did w...more
I just finished reading this book for the second time. The first time I read it, I probably would have given it five stars; something about the glimpse into Hornby's world enthralled me, but then I wasn't quite as familiar with the lifestyle of being a Premiership fan as I am now.
Set up as a series of essays, Fever Pitch depicts the life of a man who is much, much more than a casual Arsenal fan, while much less than a "hooligan." It caters to everyone who finds themselves in between those two d...more
Set up as a series of essays, Fever Pitch depicts the life of a man who is much, much more than a casual Arsenal fan, while much less than a "hooligan." It caters to everyone who finds themselves in between those two d...more
Even as a sports fan, I had trouble with this one. Perhaps if I lived in England and was familiar with the teams, players and stadiums it would have been better.
There were a few parts in the book that I could relate to as a Dodger fan that hasn't seen the world series since 1988 and a Charger fan (No description required):
"Entertainment as pain was an idea entirely new to me, and it seemed to be something I'd been waiting for".
"...and began to understand how football could mean so much to boys...more
There were a few parts in the book that I could relate to as a Dodger fan that hasn't seen the world series since 1988 and a Charger fan (No description required):
"Entertainment as pain was an idea entirely new to me, and it seemed to be something I'd been waiting for".
"...and began to understand how football could mean so much to boys...more
Hornby, a dedicated fan of London's Arsenal soccer club, traces 25 years of the waxing and waning of his obsession. Along the way, we are treated to his meditations on fan culture, whether or not soccer is a good metaphor for life, and the difficulties of growing older while a large part of your life is widely regarded as a sign of your perpetual adolescence. There are plenty of details about specific games, and Hornby refers to specific players as if their very names will trigger some sort of r...more
The perfect companion to my fantasy football season. Hornby's memoir of obsession with Arsenal was just the sort of angel/devil on my shoulder I needed to convince myself that my own obsession was OK. That the hopeless feeling I felt when I lost was understandable and that the grumbling mess I became the following week was again, OK. I noticed this happening with actual sports by the end of the season when the Chiefs magically beat the Packers and had a shot to make the playoffs (and choked, in...more
Dec 23, 2010
Aubrey
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Anyone struggling to come to grips with a fanatical obsession (especially when it relates to sports)
Short Story: Fever Pitch is an elegantly crafted memoir as an individual tries, and fails, to find the way that sport describes the ups and downs of life.
Story: At no point in this memoir do you doubt Nick Hornby's love for Arsenal or football in general. It shines through much of the way an individual's personality or temperament does. His fanaticism makes the memoir easy to relate and understand, as the reader is able to substitute in their own teams or obsessions that grip them. As a sports f...more
Story: At no point in this memoir do you doubt Nick Hornby's love for Arsenal or football in general. It shines through much of the way an individual's personality or temperament does. His fanaticism makes the memoir easy to relate and understand, as the reader is able to substitute in their own teams or obsessions that grip them. As a sports f...more
Fever Pitch is a series of short essays about Nick Hornby and how obsessed he is with Arsenal Football Club. And I thought it was fantastic. I read the whole thing in a day (it was a day off, so it’s not terribly impressive, but it is a testament to how much I enjoyed the book). Anybody who is a fan of any kind of sport - soccer, baseball, hockey, heck, even curling - will find something to enjoy in Fever Pitch.
Hornby writes about many different topics in the course of the book. We read about hi...more
Hornby writes about many different topics in the course of the book. We read about hi...more
Jul 20, 2009
Kirsty (Blatant Biblioholic)
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
non-fiction
I enjoyed this book much more than I thought I would. I had agreed in advance that I would read it with a friend but when it came to actually starting the book I wasn't particularly enthusiastic - whilst I like football, I certainly am not obsessed with it (as Hornby is) and so I wasn't sure if I'd like the book or not.
I shouldn't have worried. The book pulled me in from the first page. This is the first book I've read by Hornby and it won't be my last. It tracks his obsession with football from...more
I shouldn't have worried. The book pulled me in from the first page. This is the first book I've read by Hornby and it won't be my last. It tracks his obsession with football from...more
1 like · like · see review
As much as I am not generally a big fan of sports, I do like things relating to sports, whether they be films or books or any other medium. In particular I like sports stories that aren't simply a story of the games themselves, but of the history and the people involved. In this, Fever Pitch definitely delivered. Hornby is a die-hard Arsenal fan, and the book is split into matches, rather than into chapters. He relates games he saw and games he missed, games that other teams played that had an i...more
Many in England consider this book responsible for the modern mainstream acceptance of the game in England which saw the crowds change from working-class to middle and upper class. I am a long-time American Arsenal supporter and read the book a couple of years after falling hopelessly in love with the club. Needless to say, the book spoke to me in a very real way. I know many American Arsenal supporters who came to the club through this book. But, anyway, on to the book itself...
I'm not much for...more
I'm not much for...more
It took me a little while to get into the sort of journal-entry style of this book, but once I did, I loved it. I've always been a fan of dry British humor, and though I wouldn't call this book "humor", it definitely has flashes of that wry charm. Though he's a much longer-suffering fan than I am, and has a much, much better memory than I do, I found much to relate to in his writing. I felt that the way he addressed Heysel and Hillsborough were both simple and profound.
I can easily imagine pick...more
I can easily imagine pick...more
Oct 13, 2009
Margie
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
biographies-memoirs,
sports
I am not a football fan, and had to skip over many of Hornby's descriptions of so-and-so using this foot to score the second goal in that game which was part of that one season. But the fact that Hornby felt compelled to include these details, and that he had them stored away in his brain, is part of the story.
Fever Pitch does an excellent job of describing what it means for Hornby to be an obsessed fan. He does not take the long view, he is not detached, and his analysis comes in bits and chunk...more
Fever Pitch does an excellent job of describing what it means for Hornby to be an obsessed fan. He does not take the long view, he is not detached, and his analysis comes in bits and chunk...more
In de tweede helft van de jaren tachtig was ik heel even een voetballiefhebber. Ik ging niet naar wedstrijden kijken, maar had een vage voorliefde voor Club Brugge en kocht regelmatig Voetbalmagazine. Geen idee waarom net die club. Waterschei en Winterslag betekenden niet veel meer, Standard lag in Frankrijk en Anderlecht, dat was Anderlecht, iets voor mietjes. Het begon in de tijd van Papin en eindigde ergens rond het vertrek van Frank Farina, begin jaren negentig. En toen was de liefde op, wer...more
I've never been much of a SciFi reader, though I do love a good time-travel story, mostly because I am completely in love with planet Earth and have no desire to venture out into the universe. I am a xenophobic Earthling, and much prefer reading about variations on my world than fantastic imaginings of other worlds. Plus, I have a hard time getting into new books (who's who, etc.), so having to deal with alternative physics, moons, and bodily functions overwhelms me
That said, I found myself in a...more
That said, I found myself in a...more
If you are Football fan, you must read this book. If you are a Sports fan, obsessed with players, statistics and trivia, you must read this book. If you have difficulty explaining to others who can't understand your obsession, then you must make them read this book.
Being an Arsenal fan myself, I had wanted to read Fever Pitch for quite long. Although the book made me realise that I'm not as obsessed about the game or the club as much as Nick Hornby, I was nodding away vigorously when he narrate...more
Being an Arsenal fan myself, I had wanted to read Fever Pitch for quite long. Although the book made me realise that I'm not as obsessed about the game or the club as much as Nick Hornby, I was nodding away vigorously when he narrate...more
Synopsis:The names Liam Brady, Bob Wilson, Charlie George and Frank McLintock will roll of the tongue and by the end of this book they will be engraved in your head because Nick Hornby is Football obsessed.
Fever Pitch is Hornby’s tribute to the ever consuming passion of supporting Arsenal F.C. From his first experience in the terraces of Highbury to the championship winning seasons under manager George Graham, Hornby looks at what it truly means to be a supporter of the beautiful game.
Cover Gus...more
Fever Pitch is Hornby’s tribute to the ever consuming passion of supporting Arsenal F.C. From his first experience in the terraces of Highbury to the championship winning seasons under manager George Graham, Hornby looks at what it truly means to be a supporter of the beautiful game.
Cover Gus...more
I enjoyed this book, although as someone who is also a huge sports fan (and in particular, a lifelong die-hard fan of one particular team), probably not as much as I expected to. And ultimately, I think that's because I'm nowhere near as much of a die-hard as Hornby is, and so didn't identify with his pathologies. I'm analytical enough to not believe that my actions have any influence on the outcome of games, and also to evaluate my team's, and other teams', players with at least some degree of...more
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Nick Hornby is the author of the novels A Long Way Down, Slam, How to Be Good, High Fidelity, and About a Boy, and the memoir Fever Pitch. He is also the author of Songbook, a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award, Shakespeare Wrote for Money, and The Polysyllabic Spree, as well as the editor of the short-story collection Speaking with the Angel. He is a recipient of the American Acade...more
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“For alarmingly large chunks of an average day, I am a moron.”
—
103 people liked it
“I have always been accused of taking the things I love - football, of course, but also books and records - much too seriously, and I do feel a kind of anger when I hear a bad record, or when someone is lukewarm about a book that means a lot to me.”
—
50 people liked it
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Jun 11, 2012 11:50am