“I looked over to the north of the city, where the ghetto had been, where half a million Jews had been murdered-there was nothing (Wladyslaw Szpilman).” Wladyslaw Szpilman was a Polish pianist, composer, and memoirist who lived through, and survived, the Holocaust of World War II. Despite his death, Szpilman has not only left his memories of that gruesome time, but also his musical legacy.
Wladyslaw “Wladek” Szpilman was “born into a family of musicians (Mazelis 9),” in Poland on December 5, 1911 to Edwarda and Samuel Szpilman (Wladyslaw Szpilman (Piano) 1). He was the eldest of three siblings: Halina, Regina, and Henryk (Wladyslaw Szpilman 1911-2000 3). Following similarly under his father’s musical ‘footsteps,’ Szpilman took his first piano lesson at the Chopin School of Arts in Warsaw. This is where he found his true passion. He continued his piano studies at the Academy of the Arts in Berlin (Wladyslaw Szpilman (Piano) 1).
Up until 1939, Warsaw had been a wonderful place to live and perform. That is, until the Germans took control of the area. Ghettos were then established to privately eliminate those they felt as part of an inferior race (1). On November 15, 1940, construction on the largest ghetto, the Warsaw Ghetto, began. Szpilman and his family did not want to move to this new ‘development’; they wanted to stay and protect their home and honor. Towards the end of 1939, Jews were forced to wear armbands that displayed a Star of David (Wladyslaw Szpilman 1911-2000 4).
These ghettos were also very unsanitary. Lice were common and often were carriers of typhus. 5,000 people died every month from typhus alone (Wladyslaw Szpilman (Piano) 1). Bodies of the dead could not even be buried fast enough, so often they lay in the ...
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...after experiencing the horrors of the war, he still lived on and never gave up doing what he loved. Not only was he a survivor, he was a hero and inspiration. His works and legacy live on today in his music and children. He should be one man we never forget.
Works Cited
Kivy, Peter. “Musical Morality.” 23 Apr. 2014. http://www.cairn.info/
Schnepf, Alicija and Drabik, Anna. “A War-Torn
Childhood.” 18 Apr. 2014. http://www.sites.google.com/ “Szpilman’s Warsaw: The History behind The Pianist.”
23 Apr. 2014. http://www.ushmm.org/
Szpilman, Wladyslaw, and Wilm Hosenfeld. The Pianist:
The Extraordinary Story of One Man’s Survival in
Warsaw, 1939-45. New York: Picador USA, 1999.
23 Apr. 2014.
“Wladyslaw Szpilman.” 23 Apr. 2014. http://www.angelfire.com/ “Wladyslaw Szpilman (Piano) – Short Biography.” 23
Apr. 2014. http://www.bach-cantatas.com/
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Szabolcsi, Bence, Gyorgy Kroo. A Concise History of Hungarian Music. Budapest: Barrie and Rockliff, 1964.
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