Finally I wish to thank my friend Judy Lyden for the ideas, inspiration, and constructive feedback. Thanks Judy for your veritable wellspring of creativity which never fails to get me pumped up. You’ll never know how many times you helped get me unstuck. Check out Judy Lyden’s brilliant and hilarious book Pork Chops.
My love and gratitude to all those who played a part in getting this book to print.
About the Author
M. GRACE BERNARDIN majored in Communications and Religious
Studies at the College of Mount Saint Joseph’s and has a M.S. in Counseling from the University of Evansville. She has worked in Human Relations and Pastoral Care and she lives in Evansville, Indiana, with her husband, John, and their two sons. This is her first novel.
She may be contacted at: [email protected]
M. Grace Bernardin
The Miracle of Stalag 8A – Beauty Beyond the Horror
Olivier Messiaen and the Quartet for the End of Time
by
John William McMullen
copyright 2010
“On 15 January 1941, in a German prison camp in Silesia, music triumphed over Time, breaking free of rhythm and liberating a quartet of French prisoners and their listeners from the horrors of their time. The Quartet for the End of Time has earned its place in the canon and history of Western music, but, more important, it has earned its place in our hearts. Its musical beauty, at once terrifying and sublime, exalts listeners and performers alike, and the story of its creators stands as a testament to the powers of music and human will to transcend the most terrible of times.” – Rebecca Rischin, Associate Professor, Ohio University School of Music, and author of FOR THE END OF TIME: THE STORY OF THE MESSIAEN QUARTET (Cornell University Press, 2003; 2006).
“McMullen is a master par excellence when it comes to historical fiction. His latest is worthy of the Shakespearean phrase, ‘if music be the food of love, play on, give me excess of it.’ The Miracle of Stalag 8A is a deeply moving piece reminiscent of the dissonant sounds of the quartet itself, which breaks with temporality in order to touch the endless moment of timelessness. Mingled with undying faith in a time of horrors that induced disbelief in many, the music gives us a hope, in the words of the novel, for a ‘virginal peace pregnant with possibility’.”
– Steven C. Scheer, Ph. D., author of The Heart Ages, But It Doesn’t Grow Old
“World War II engulfed so many and so much in its darkness, and yet its upheaval also called some to create a revelation of faith and hope. As Messiaen’s music captures both this desolation and praise, McMullen recreates with simple directness the human situation of Messiaen and his fellow prisoners and their triumphal first performance of this master work of twentieth century music which transcends time.”
- Rev. Harry Hagan O.S.B., Associate Professor of Scripture, Saint Meinrad Seminary.
“The Miracle of Stalag VIIIA points to the way in which the composer’s music encapsulated yet transcended its circumstances to speak to people of diverse beliefs, and none.”
–Dr. Christopher Dingle, author of The Life of Messiaen (Cambridge University Press, 2007).
“The musical world interprets the miracle of Stalag 8A as the perfect performance of the "Quartet for the End of Time" in inhuman conditions by musicians suffering from cold and slow starvation. Most critics will wax rhapsodic as they praise McMullen for building his novel to the crescendo of the premier of the “Quartet,” that briefly released both captives and captors from the brutality of their situation and moved them all to silence. However, the miracle that McMullen also subtly chronicles is the coming together as one the four musicians: Messiaen, the faithful-Catholic and mystic composer; Pasquier, the fallen-away Catholic agnostic cellist; le Boulaire, the atheist violinist; and the irrepressible Akoka, warrior Trotskyite Jew and master of the clarinet.”
– Phillip E. Pierpont, Ph.D., Professor of English and former Academic Dean, Vincennes University, Vincennes, Indiana
The enigmatic Messiaen, avant-garde composer, devout Catholic, and ornithologist, composes the Quartet in Stalag 8A, transforming man’s inhumanity to man with hope. Yet to the avant-garde, he was too traditional and too religious; to the traditionalists and religious, he was too avant-garde. As a result he will always stand somewhere outside of Time.
– The Publisher
John William McMullen
J
Other Books from Bird Brain Publishing
Praise for
POOR SOULS
by
John William McMullen
“…The intention of this writer is to highlight the ordinary, and indeed the sinful, as being transformed by grace into something worthy of God. Poor Souls is a front-runner of the Catholic novel, though this is not immediately apparent because of its unpretentiousness.
“So why does it haunt me and why do I want to hail it as an outstanding Catholic novel? Because the writer is an unswervingly honest professional with something pertinent to say, and because he says it with quiet sobriety without ever resorting to ‘pious-speak’.”
– Leo Madigan, Fatima-Ophel Books
“…There is a realism that made me double check the genre to make sure it wasn't nonfiction. You probably know the people in this novel….”
– Amanda Killgore, Huntress Reviews
“POOR SOULS gives the reader a rollicking tale of seminarians and priests in their service of the church. McMullen, writing as an insider, masterfully strikes insightful chords of humor without resorting to ridicule.”
– Clark Gabriel Field, (The Celibate)
“An unexpected revelation of life in the seminary and parish, McMullen reveals the very human lives of Roman Catholic clergy knowingly yet lovingly. McMullen’s novel is so real it will make you laugh and cry at the same time. Uproariously shrewd and marvelously told.”
– Doug Chambers, (The Joshua Decree)
“McMullen’s tale of seminarian Martin Flanagan is a delightful read, especially in these times when many people are concerned about the future of the Catholic priesthood.”
– BJ Conner, (Irish Legacy)
“Half of the Catholics who read POOR SOULS will love it; the other half will want to burn the author at the stake.”
– Bill Groves, Manager of Corporate Services,
Ivy Tech Community College
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