Six letters written by Frederic Chopin, thought to be lost in 1939, have been found and donated to a Warsaw museum dedicated to the Polish composer.
The letters, written by Chopin to his parents and sisters between 1845 and 1848, were believed lost after the outbreak of World War II.
After it emerged in 2003 that they still existed in a private collection, moves were made to secure them.
Chopin was born in Poland in 1810 but spent half of his life in France.
According to museum curator Alicja Knast, the letters were last displayed in public in Poland in 1932 and were still confirmed as being in Warsaw in 1939.
It is thought the letters went missing, like many other cultural artefacts, after the Nazis invaded Poland.
There’s a bit of family humor that came to mind immediately, as I have a step-nephew whose birth took my father in a literary direction … as was often his angle. Born to my Chinese sister, Debbie, and her Japanese husband, Dad decided the kids needed a nickname. What came to mind were a couple of James Clavell novels … Shogun and Tai-Pan, one being set in Japan, the other in China. He called the boy “Taigun”, because, as he said, “Sho-pan” wouldn’t work because he was Polish.
From there I jumped to Paris where I shot the photo you see here at the grave of the real Chopin on a day I solitarily rambled the Pére Lachaise Cemetery in the company of my son’s spirit on the first anniversary of his death … Jaren’s, not Chopin’s.
So it was the second of June last year I sat for a time at Chopin’s grave. Listening in my head to his “Nocturn”, I contemplated the accomplishments of his mere 39 years of life and, in keeping with my situation at that moment, his doomed relationship with the writer George Sand and the heartbreak that virtually ended his days as a composer … and as a man among the living.
His grave is lovely, a peaceful, perpetually flower-strewn resting place reminding all of not only the music, but also the passionate transplanted Pole amongst Parisians … his heart, by the way, rests in Poland at his wish it be removed upon his death and buried there … the complicated lover to a complicated woman.
As often is the case with artists, neither Chopin nor Sand were easy and their relationship was unconventional. She was an older woman with strong passions of her own and a long string of relationships.
“She was a thinking bosom and one who overpowered her young lovers, all Sybil — a Romantic.”
~ V.S. Pritchett
He was physically weak and needed such babying she referred to him often as her “third child” and a “beloved little corpse”.
Artistically, neither were easy:
Chopin is at the piano, quite oblivious of the fact that anyone is listening. He embarks on a sort of casual improvisation, then stops. ‘Go on, go on,’ exclaims Delacroix, ‘That’s not the end!’ ‘It’s not even a beginning. Nothing will come … nothing but reflections, shadows, shapes that won’t stay fixed. I’m trying to find the right colour, but I can’t even get the form …’ ‘You won’t find the one without the other,’ says Delacroix, ‘and both will come together.’ ‘What if I find nothing but moonlight?’ ‘Then you will have found the reflection of a reflection.’
That they lived and loved and died is history, as everything eventually becomes. Their lives were what they were, and 162 years after his death he fills me with music and sets me to pondering the bumpy, uncomfortable roads traveled and the resulting detritus of our journeys.
The news that letters have been found feels almost like a gift from that grave I visited, and I’m more than pleased that email wasn’t an option in those years between 1845 and 1848 when he wrote them.
I’ve not seen the letters, and it doesn’t matter much if I never do. Here, however, is an example of him finding the reflection of a reflection:
music truly is a universal language, and has the power to drown out and/or release emotion when other things fail.
very true about the loss of written correspondence. there is a big box of letters in our basement filled with handwritten letters from my mother, grandmother, extended friends and family. the handwriting on each is unique.
I have those sorts of letters, too, Amy, and regret the loss of them as email has taken over. I do like the almost instant gratification of the electronic version of communication, especially living so far out of the loop, but there is a trade-off.
instant gratification gets my vote, with a nod towards the loss. my handwriting is horrid anyhow.
Mine got worse as my typing improved.
same here, must use different fine muscles. mine was bad to begin with, now pretty much hopeless.
Much can be learned from the graves of those who passed away… but known and unknown if one only listens….but like much other art form, listening has become almost instinct 🙂 glad to see someone still does perform it though, not to mention performs it as well as you Sandy
Listening is one of my favorite activities. It’s so much more active than just hearing …
so very true, yet the subtle difference between the two is lost on so many
One active, one passive, and I’m not passive by nature.
Wow, that was an interesting story, Sandra. Thank you for the music, it’s beautiful.
What struck me most was Sand’s term of endearment, “beloved little corpse”. ….. and then he died. Wow, life is full of interesting stories.
I related to well too her “beloved little corpse” line … dammit.
Hahahahaha! 🙂
~laughs~ I bet you are not….
Well, actually I CAN be, but only with prompting and when feeling safe …
mmm I know what you mean….
😉