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Product Description
From Amazon
Written immediately after the end of World War II, this morally complex Holocaust memoir is notable for its exact depiction of the grim details of life in Warsaw under the Nazi occupation. "Things you hardly noticed before took on enormous significance: a comfortable, solid armchair, the soothing look of a white-tiled stove," writes Wladyslaw Szpilman, a pianist for Polish radio when the Germans invaded. His mother's insistence on laying the table with clean linen for their midday meal, even as conditions for Jews worsened daily, makes palpable the Holocaust's abstract horror. Arbitrarily removed from the transport that took his family to certain death, Szpilman does not deny the "animal fear" that led him to seize this chance for escape, nor does he cheapen his emotions by belaboring them. Yet his cool prose contains plenty of biting rage, mostly buried in scathing asides (a Jewish doctor spared consignment to "the most wonderful of all gas chambers," for example). Szpilman found compassion in unlikely people, including a German officer who brought food and warm clothing to his hiding place during the war's last days. Extracts from the officer's wartime diary (added to this new edition), with their expressions of outrage at his fellow soldiers' behavior, remind us to be wary of general condemnation of any group. --Wendy Smith
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
From Publishers Weekly
Originally published in Poland in 1945 but then suppressed by the Communist authorities, this memoir of survival in the Warsaw Ghetto joins the ranks of Holocaust memoirs notable as much for their literary value as for their historical significance. Szpilman, a Jewish classical pianist, played the last live music broadcast from Warsaw before Polish Radio went off the air in September 1939 because of the German invasion. In a tone that is at once dispassionate and immediate, Szpilman relates the horrors of life inside the ghetto. But his book is distinguished by the dazzling clarity he brings to the banalities of ghetto life, especially the eerie normalcy of some social relations amid catastrophic upheaval. He shows how Jewish residents of the Polish capital adjusted to life under the occupation: "The armbands branding us as Jews did not bother us, because we were all wearing them, and after some time living in the ghetto I realized that I had become thoroughly used to them." Using a reporter's powers of description, Szpilman, who is still alive at the age of 88, records the chilling conversations that took place as Jews waited to be transported to their deaths. "We're not heroes!" he recalls his father saying. "We're perfectly ordinary people, which is why we prefer to risk hoping for that 10 per cent chance of living." In a twist that exemplifies how this book will make readers look again at a history they thought they knew, he details how a German captain saved his life. Employing language that has more in common with the understatement of Primo Levi than with the moral urgency of Elie Wiesel, Szpilman is a remarkably lucid observer and chronicler of how, while his family perished, he survived thanks to a combination of resourcefulness and chance. (Sept.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent,
By nadnuk12 (Toronto, Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945 (Paperback)
This book was absolutely amazing, well written, and beatifully described. The scenes and the book were so vivid, you felt as if you were actually there and felt those moments. This is a sad story, but the fight and survival of this one man was truly something.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Powerful Account of One Life,
By John and Geri (Sayville NY) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945 (Paperback)
We saw the movie "The Pianist" on tv, which was excellent and left us wanting to know more about this man Szpilman. We bought his book and it is truly a horror story as well as a story of courage and survival. Lest we ever forget what happened to six million people simply because of their 'mere biological fact of being a jew' (as quoted from Szpilman in his book). This man brings it all down to the personal level, one man against all the odds of survival in such a cruel and murderous occupation. My wife went to bed some nights (while reading this book) unable to sleep, trying to put herself into the position of these people who were starved, treated worse than animals, humiliated, separated from their families, murdered and discarded. It will always beg the question: How can one human being be so cruel to another human being? We both highly recommend this book to hear this man's powerful story.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Book For All,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945 (Paperback)
I was thirteen when The Pianist movie was made. I begged my parents to let me see it, and I finally watched it at age fourteen. That night, I could not sleep. I had heard of the Holocaust before and we had studied it in 8th grade and I had seen movies about it, but there was something so gripping about this man's story that it seemed to be in another league of any Holocaust story I had ever heard about or seen.The movie piqued my intrest in the Holocaust and also in this incredible man who survived all odds. A few months after I had watched the movie, I went out and bought the book. After I started the book, I could hardly put it down. I finished the book in two days, facing another two sleepless nights, haunted by his passages from Dancing on Chlorea Street, and feeling his emotions as he ran into Captain Wilm Hosenfeld for the first time. I would recommend this book to anyone, no matter the age. The book is truly haunting and Wladyslaw Szpilman's words and memories are bound to stay with you.
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