Poland

by James A. Michener

  When the laughter stopped she said, again in French: Tonight I am proud to play for you selections from our great Polish pianist Frederic Chopin.’ From various quarters in the audience, marking areas where Poles sat, came murmurs of approval, at which she repeated her announcement, this time in halting German. Some applauded.

  She proceeded to outline her program: ‘First I shall play the Ballade in G minor, Opus 23, then a few waltzes, and a lovely scherzo …’ When she said this last word, Bukowski felt the count snap to attention and heard him whisper something to his wife, but the young man was diverted when the pianist said with great charm: ‘And I shall conclude with music that we pianists like very much, the études.’

  Seating herself carefully at the piano, adjusting her filmy white dress and testing her reach to the keys, she paused a long moment as if for the audience to appreciate how small she was and how large the task she was undertaking. Then suddenly she darted forth her hands and struck those five lovely notes which comprised the opening theme. She played with such alternating force and delicacy that the audience made no sound, listening intently to the flow of Chopin’s beautifully contrived composition.

  Bukowski, who intuitively preferred the opening orchestral selections to the singing, and the singing to piano solos, listened respectfully, proud that a Polish artist was playing music by a Polish composer, but not really involving himself in it. And even when Mlle. Szprot came to those faerylike arabesques that decorated the middle portion of the ballade, he remained detached, continuing so when she reached the thunderous closing passages.

  ‘The little one can play,’ Lubonski whispered as the ballade came to a conclusion in which the five opening notes reappeared in force, then drifted gently away in the same melancholy which had characterized the Mahler songs.

  The audience applauded loudly, more for the charm of the artist than for the skill of the composer, and like a practiced little flirt, Mlle. Szprot bowed gracefully and placed her hands over her lips as if she wanted to express her thanks but did not dare speak.

  She played seven short waltzes with the delicate touch that one would have expected: extremely feminine, obviously light, almost inconsequential, but with such inventiveness as to make them proper ornaments for any Christmas celebration. Bukowski liked them, but realized that they were music on a much less intense plane than either the Beethoven or the Mozart.

  Indeed, he was about to dismiss Chopin as a transparent lesser artist when Mlle. Szprot brought her waltzes to a graceful conclusion, full of arabesques and adornments, after which she left the piano, came forward toward the edge of the stage and said, first in French, then in Polish: ‘This is Christmas and I bring to my Polish friends a special present. First a group of seven mazurkas, the wonderful music that only Chopin could have written, and then …’

  Again Bukowski felt Lubonski stiffen, and turned toward him as the count grasped his arm almost in apprehension. ‘And then I shall play for you the music we Poles have always loved at Christmas, the Scherzo in B minor.’ As she said this, Lubonski gave a muffled cry of delight, gripped Wiktor’s arm even more tightly, and whispered: ‘I knew she would play it!’

  It was a much different Krystyna Szprot who returned to the piano. Grimly, forcefully, as if she must make an important statement for all Poles living in exile, whether in Paris or the capitals of captivity like St. Petersburg, Berlin or Vienna, she attacked the mazurkas, those curious and terrifyingly inventive compositions which only a Pole could have written. The mazurka had begun as a kind of peasant square dance, much loved by Chopin when he was a boy living in the country, but in his creative hands it became a work of masterful overtone and implication. One English critic, marveling at the effects Chopin achieved with the form, said: ‘He took cobwebs of Italian moonlight, French elegance and German romanticism, mixing them all with Polish heroics, making of them something to which the Polish heart responds.’

  On this night that judgment was accurate, for when the Poles in the audience heard the famous rhythm of the mazurka, the same three-quarter construction as a waltz but with a much different beat, their hearts seemed to expand, as if some special and great musician were playing solely for them. No other nation had such music, and no other composer had used the country idiom so effectively. Bukowski was especially moved by a brief mazurka consisting of 1-2-3 repeated four times in a minor key; when he heard it he felt himself back on the banks of the Vistula.

  But when Mlle. Szprot announced that she would conclude with the two mazurkas she particularly liked, he suspected that these might be something special and he listened with added attention, hearing in the first as gently modeled and poetic a piece of music as Chopin was to write; and in the second, a poem of broken rhythms, minor chords and subtle harmonics. The man who wrote this music, Bukowski concluded, was no ordinary genius.

  Count Lubonski listened to the mazurkas with his head bowed, as if he wished no one to see how profoundly the music was affecting him, but this apparently was not the case, for when the great Polish dances came to an end he gripped Bukowski’s arm again and whispered almost with joy: ‘Now we shall hear something! Do you know this scherzo?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You will.’

  At the first crashing chords of the Scherzo in B minor, Opus 20, several Poles in the audience began to applaud, but Bukowski could ascertain nothing unusual in the music; it seemed more chaotic and disorganized than the mazurkas, but as it progressed he began to hear chords of great distinction, as if they knew they were presaging something of importance, and he noticed that Lubonski tensed whenever these particular chords were struck. But then the music degenerated into mere frenzy and he lost its thread.

  Then, however, after the most careful preparation the chords reappeared, very gently, very softly, transposing to a new key, after which came a long pause, and then the beginning of a theme even more ravishing than that used earlier by Mozart. It was perfection, and several Poles began humming in accompaniment, for it was a Christmas cradle song dating back a thousand years, an authentic voice of people to whom the coming of winter had been a time of starvation and terror and hope. At the start of the second statement of the theme, Bukowski heard the count and countess whispering softly:

  ‘Lulaj-że, Jezuniu, moja perełko …’

  (Rockabye, little Jesus, my little pearl …)

  Bukowski, whose grandmother had sung this to him, sat with hands clenched, tears forming in his eyes, and he was actually relieved when Mlle. Szprot began pounding the piano in a recapitulation of the earlier frenzied wandering, but even as she did so, he began to hear those premonitory chords which assured him that the cradle song would appear one last time. It came, but in a much distorted form, as if to say that even Christmas passes.

  Drained of emotion, Bukowski did not applaud at the conclusion of the scherzo. On this festive night he had frolicked with Beethoven, rejoiced with one of the best things Mozart ever wrote, sung of love with Brahms, and wandered over dark plains with Mahler. He had also peered into the soul of Poland, and he was much disturbed. He therefore looked with detachment when Mlle. Szprot came forward to announce her last segment: ‘Some people consider Frederic Chopin not too manly. I’ll conclude with some of his more vigorous études.’

  She marched back to her piano like a little soldier, stopped, reflected, then said: ‘I am playing tonight on a Pleyel piano. One that Chopin once used in this city.’ And with that she slammed herself down on the stool, stamped her right foot on the pedal, and launched into seven of the strongest études, those strange pieces of music lacking in melody or poetic form but filled with the inherent power of the piano. But when one had accepted them as merely the exercises of a brilliant keyboard artist, they unexpectedly erupted into passages of extremely moving music, and when played by a contentious little Polish woman eager to display the full range of her favorite composer, they could be explosive.

  She had arranged her selection with care. First a pair of quiet, intricate exer
cises that contributed only virtuosity, then two much appreciated by other musicians, the ‘Aeolian Harp’ in A flat major, Opus 25, No. 1, and the ‘Butterfly’ in G flat major, Opus 25, No. 9.

  Bukowski did not know enough about the piano to appreciate the first four études, and since they featured no memorable melody, he listened quietly and without feeling obligated to respond, even though both composer and artist were fellow Poles. But when the pianist leaped into the ‘Revolutionary Étude’ in C minor, Opus 10, No. 9, he could visualize his ancestor dashing into battle with Tadeusz Kosciuszko a hundred years earlier, for this was music right from the heart of Polish history, a fiery challenge, a call to patriotism—and he responded.

  He was therefore in an unsettled frame of mind when she paused after the conclusion of the ‘Revolutionary,’ took a deep breath, and crashed out the eight powerful notes which constituted the structure of ‘Winter Wind’ in A minor, Opus 25, No. 11. Still, he was not impressed, for it seemed too repetitive, the eight minor notes being first offered in a very loud version, then in a whisper, then in a host of variations, and he had about concluded that this very long concert had effectively ended with the earlier Chopin, when Mlle. Szprot began to play the last étude Chopin had written.

  At first it signified little, some agitated arpeggios serving as a capstone to the evening, but then, to his amazement, he heard another set of deep chords beginning to evolve, once more predicting something of majesty. Then it came, a sequence of thirteen of the most wonderful chords he had ever heard. Perhaps no one else in that large hall even noticed them, and certainly none could interpret them as he did, but across the years of desolation and despair, the exile Chopin spoke to the exile Bukowski, and the world was turned upside down.

  This last étude was not long, only two and a half minutes, but when the great chords appeared again, amid the wild fireworks, Bukowski could only sit limp in his seat. He did not applaud. He did not cheer when the pianist reappeared to bow and accept bouquets, nor did he rise when the Lubonskis did. He had been overwhelmed by a night which had struck him with fury, but the more significant episodes were only beginning.

  When he left the theater, still bedazed, he found Count Lubonski’s four carriages, each with its Lippizaners handsomely combed, and he remembered that it was his assignment to fetch the Munich singers to the reception being held at 22 Annagasse, so he told the driver of his carriage to pull aside and wait while he sought the musicians, and when he had them together, he bundled them into bear rugs for the journey through the cold Viennese night. To reach the count’s residence they had to cross the city, and as the carriage swayed through the streets lightly covered with snow, Wiktor had an opportunity to talk with the Germans, and when he told them how much he had enjoyed the two duets ‘O die Frauen’ and ‘A bird will fly afar’ the singers were pleased with his knowledge of their work, and the two men began to sing their apostrophe to women, with Wiktor and the two women joining in, so that the carriage was filled with music. Then the women began their song about the necessity of finding a good man before happiness could be attained, and at the conclusion Bukowski asked: ‘Do you think that’s true? That every woman must seek till she finds her man?’ and the soprano said with disgust: ‘All men are donkeys,’ to which the contralto agreed heartily.

  ‘Now wait!’ the tenor protested, whereupon the soprano snapped: ‘And you in particular.’ The tenor tried to defend himself, but the contralto attacked him savagely, whereupon the soprano began to weep, drawing off into her corner, and Bukowski was perplexed. Onstage the four singers had appeared so handsome, so intertwined in their responsibilities that to think of them now engaged in some quarrel not explained was deflating. He judged that all of the singers were older than himself, in their thirties at least, and he supposed that they were married, in pairings he would never know about, and in his already disturbed mood he felt profoundly sorry for them.

  ‘Was it pleasing?’ he asked in German. ‘To sing the Mahler in four voices?’

  ‘Frankly, it was disgraceful,’ the baritone said, and now he withdrew into his corner and conversation ended.

  But Bukowski wanted to discuss this exciting concert: ‘Did you happen to notice those great chords in the last étude?’

  ‘The what?’ the tenor asked.

  ‘Chopin’s last étude.’

  ‘We weren’t listening,’ the tenor said.

  When the carriage pulled into the Lubonski courtyard and the singers saw the beautiful pyracantha, lit by six lanterns, they chattered noisily about the orange berries, the snow and the joy of being in Vienna. However, when they preceded Bukowski up the stairs to the main floor where the reception was to be held, a Viennese newspaperman said to Bukowski: ‘Four second-class voices. You’d never get the first-class to leave Munich at Christmas.’ Wiktor then learned that they were sailing next day to Budapest, and for a moment as they disappeared ahead of him he saw them as Mahler’s wanderers, lost like himself on the plains of Europe.

  The large room in which the Lubonskis entertained opened onto three others, so that 22 Annagasse provided an almost regal reception area and was decorated accordingly, with marble statues from Greece, red-and-gold curtains, small boughs fresh-cut from woodlands and many gilded chairs. In the center of the main wall stood a grand piano, for with the Polish nobility no evening was complete without music, and when the guests were assembled an important-looking, heavy man went to the piano, but not to play.

  He was Herr Dr. Henzzler, leading music critic with a Berlin newspaper, and he said: ‘Count and Countess, ladies and gentlemen, artists of the evening, the city of Vienna has been a most gracious hostess, and all of us from Berlin thank you. We thank you for a most German Christmas.’

  Bukowski thought this an inappropriate and even ungracious statement, as if Germans held a monopoly on the holiday, but before he could develop this line of thinking his attention was diverted from Herr Dr. Henzzler to Krystyna Szprot, who appeared in a different dress, one which made her look even more elfin and delightful. A group of men quickly surrounded her, but he elbowed his way through and was paying his respects when Henzzler announced: ‘To complete our evening, Herr Limbrecht, one of Berlin’s greatest, whom you heard interpret the Mozart so magnificently, will perform for us Beethoven’s immortal Appassionata, after which Fräaulein Szprot will play something by Chopin.’

  Bukowski winced at the comparison: The immortal Appassionata and something by Chopin,’ and he watched Henzzler with distaste as the self-important critic showed pianist Limbrecht to the stool, as if he, Henzzler, were the host and in charge of this gala evening. In fact, Bukowski was so irritated by everything that had happened in the salon since his arrival that he scarcely heard the very good rendition of the Beethoven.

  During the playing he moved close to Mlle. Szprot, who at one point whispered in French: ‘Are you Polish?’ and he replied in that language: ‘I certainly am,’ and a fellowship manifested itself not only in her approving smile but in the fact that she reached out and grasped his hand momentarily, sending wild shivers up his spine. But when he attempted to hold her hand, she pushed him off and indicated with a toss of her pretty head that he must listen to the Appassionata, which was now moving into the slow and profoundly disturbing middle segment. Seeing Bukowski’s disappointment at her rejection, she said in Polish: ‘He plays very well,’ and he whispered back: ‘But not as good as you.’

  When the Beethoven ended, to an enthusiastic applause led by Count Lubonski, Herr Dr. Henzzler returned to the piano to announce: ‘And now we shall have a divertissement by Fräulein Szprot and her fellow countryman Chopin.’

  Moving like a grand duchess to the piano, Krystyna Szprot stuck her jaw forward and announced in German: ‘I shall be playing the greatest sonata of recent history, B flat minor, Opus 35.’ She glared at the Berlin critic and plunged directly, and with a certain heaviness, into the Chopin masterpiece, but after the preliminary flights of tentative music were passed, she reached the wonde
rfully inventive passages in which the piano was made to sing in unaccustomed rhythms and exult in broken harmonies.

  The audience separated itself into two halves: those Germans and Austrians who longed for the heavy, unbroken beat of the Mozart-Beethoven style, in which all parts were under control, with the music moving forward in orderly progression, as it should; and the Poles and French and some of the empire’s minorities who responded to the more Slavic-Gallic improvisations of Chopin. No one was indifferent or perched in the middle. In Vienna you liked either Beethoven or Chopin and you defended your preference.

  Lubonski and Bukowski, men from the Vistula, adopted Chopin and thrilled as the pianist gave him a majestic reading, subduing any effeminate tendency that some critics noted and making his music march with grandeur within a great tradition. With Beethoven, Lubonski thought during the energetic second movement, the piano was a kind of orchestra on four legs; with Chopin, it was an eagle soaring free.

  But now Mlle. Szprot came to the third movement, that extraordinary funeral march which tore the human soul apart, reminding it of things dark and gravelike, and everyone in the salon paid close attention, for this was music just beyond the perimeter of what music could accomplish. The pianist seemed incredibly petite and wispily human as her deft hands played this heroic composition, but the effect was spoiled when she darted into the curious final movement, a brief minute and a third of confused chords that seemed to have no relationship whatever to the sonata as a whole, and certainly no contact at all with the stately funeral march.