I'm supposing the facts of my life are well documented elsewhere, and need no repeating here. They are fairly pedestrian. I don't consider that I've done anything remarkable, although I am happy to have authored a few books in what might be described as my old age, which some have told me will be read long after I'm gone. I hope so. It's nice to think I will have left something behind that has added even a little to man's knowledge.

 

I think the best way to answer the question how it is that I came to write beginning around age seventy (I'm now ninety-five), is to go all the way back to my first few years when I'm told I was always asking my elders, "Why?" That encapsulates my still continuing wonder at the world and the gift of life. That inquisitiveness has led me to passion about literature, music, and all the arts, to my profession as a lawyer, my humanism and respect for others and their rights, appreciation of scholarship, and ultimately to a deeper understanding and pride in my ethnicity, both American and Jewish. My wife, Lois, the soul of generosity, taught me much of what I know about that vital facet. 

 

Along the way, those elements coalesced into the desire to create something of value for my fellows. I'm still attempting to do more along those lines, this time about music, an art that binds us together, and which we probably could not do without. I'm drawn to subjects that in my understanding overarch the passing phases of history which often tend to elevate mechanistic, materialistic, and militaristic values. I do believe that "the best things in life are free."

In one way or another, all of my many interests are connected with education, sorely needed in these fraught times. Our very survival on this planet is connected to education, especially in the now denigrated and demeaned liberal arts, where humanism resides. So where better than to provide resources, as I'm now doing, than to the furtherance of a liberal arts education, especially to the University of Massachusetts which has grown so encompassing since my time there over sixty years ago. You might say my mind was exponentially expanded when I majored in English literature there all that time ago, and that I was sent into the world well prepared to grow further, even as the university was growing close by during those very same years.  

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The below words, which I wrote somewhat later, added to my evolving thoughts on why I write, a concept most authors feel matures over time. They are from a letter I wrote to the twenty-one world class musicians with whom I conversed to write Intimate Conversations: Face to Face with Matchless Musicians:

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“These past few months spent putting this book together have been an odyssey for me. To produce a book fulfilling my dream of a layman probing into the psyches of musicians who have thrilled me for a lifetime is an unlikely dream come true! It has brought forth talents in producing the book in addition to its writing I never knew I had. It is a beautiful book. To see it take life is an astounding life enhancing experience, especially for a nonagenarIan. In its present form it will find a home in musical and regular libraries including the Library of Congress, musical, historical, and other associations, symphony orchestras, museums, the homes of my many friends and associates, other appropriate institutions, and others. I will then use my energy to place it with a foremost trade publisher to give it the popular dissemination I believe it deserves. I am optimistic about that prospect.

 

“I might also add that the nature of the book makes it not only one to be read for pleasure, but also appropriate as a reference work to be used as a teaching tool in college courses not only focused on music directly, but also as music and musicians relate to the values of Western culture. To that end, I have contracted for a general index easily navigable to all the book’s topics by all academics whether teachers, students, or researchers.”

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