Nocturne
Page 48
She looked around and lowered her voice. ‘Do you know where he is?’
Elzunia shook her head and started to say something but her aunt placed a finger over her lips to indicate that she should whisper.
‘There’s no one here, Aunty.’ Elzunia couldn’t help smiling. ‘You should relax. The war is over.’
Her aunt didn’t smile back. ‘That’s what you don’t understand,’ she said. ‘One war is over but another has just begun.’
In a voice that was barely audible, she proceeded to describe the poisonous atmosphere of mistrust and suspicion that had spread over Poland. ‘This communist government that’s been foisted on us is paranoid,’ she whispered. ‘They’ve arrested and tried leaders of the AK, as well as airmen who flew for the RAF. They’re treating the people who fought for our freedom as traitors and fascists. Even the priests are being arrested and tortured.’
Elzunia stared at her aunt. If anyone else had told her these things, she would have been sceptical but there was no doubting her sincerity.
Her aunt gave a heavy sigh. ‘Like you, I thought we’d won the war, but we’ve just exchanged one lot of oppressors for another.’
She looked at Elzunia’s worried face and put her arm around her shoulders. ‘I’m sure your father knows the situation and that’s why he hasn’t returned. It isn’t even safe for him to write, because censors open all the letters from non-communist countries. But I’m sure one day it will be safe for him to come back, and, when he does, you’ll be able to sort everything out.’
Elzunia sat for a long time in dejected silence, mulling over her aunt’s words. Returning to Warsaw, she had expected blackouts, food rationing and shortages, but not a new kind of tyranny. Perhaps Aunt Amalia was right. You had to keep looking up at the stars to remind yourself of the beauty of the world.
Sixty-Eight
On a bright April morning, Elzunia was strolling along the quiet paths of the Praski Park on her way to the hospital. As usual, thoughts of the past threatened to overwhelm her, and to dispel them she kept her eyes fixed on the beds of irises and hyacinths, and her thoughts on Gittel and Zbyszek. Whenever her eyes strayed across the river to the Old Town, she averted her gaze. Too many memories. Like a tightrope walker feeling her way across the wire, she knew how easy it would be to slip, lose her balance, and plunge into the blackness.
Elzunia glanced at her watch. She still had half an hour before her shift. Sitting down on a wooden bench she closed her eyes and felt the warmth of the spring sun on her eyelids. She touched the amber brooch she always wore pinned to her blouse and felt that her mother was close by, watching over her.
The park, peaceful and shady, was conducive to contemplation, and its serenity calmed her mind. In the six months since she had arrived at her aunt’s place, most things had fallen into place. The children had settled in at school, and Aunt Amalia took care of them while Elzunia worked at the hospital.
Even Stefan seemed to be getting his life in order, judging from the letter he sent from Kraków. He enthused about the city and a girl he had met there. He was working as a clerk but assured Elzunia that as soon as he’d saved enough money he would study law at the Jagellonian University.
Elzunia looked across at the ruins on the other side of the river, and reflected on Stefan’s letter. He was wise to move to a city that hadn’t been bombed. She thought about Granny’s building, damaged beyond repair, and sighed. As Toughie had predicted, the old woman had been forced to move, and Elzunia’s efforts to find her had so far been fruitless, but, as she sat in the park and recalled Granny’s kindness, she strengthened her resolve to keep searching for her.
Her reverie was interrupted by a pair of young lovers walking past. They stopped by the huge beech tree on the other side of the path and, leaning against its trunk, began kissing passionately. Elzunia looked away so that the envy in her eyes wouldn’t stab them. Her tranquillity shattered, she rose and walked slowly to the hospital.
Some of the other nurses had already arrived for the afternoon shift and the common room was filled with light-hearted chatter about boyfriends, scandals, clothes and movies. Elzunia rarely joined in their conversations. She was changing into her uniform and pulling on her black stockings when she overheard two nurses chatting.
‘My sister is in charge of the surgical ward over at St John’s Hospital and she says their new medical superintendent is really strange,’ one of them said. ‘He wears a funny cap and tells everyone to call him by his first name …’
Elzunia shot up so suddenly that her chair fell backwards and clattered to the floor. Without waiting to change her clothes, she bolted outside. She longed to rush straight to St John’s, but fear and apprehension held her back. She needed time to collect her thoughts and find the strength to cope with possible disappointment.
Surely there couldn’t be any doubt. It had to be him. But what if it wasn’t? And suppose it was, and he’d found someone else?
Calm down, she kept telling herself. Calm down. But the more she tried to compose herself, the more jittery her mind became as it jumped from one disturbing thought to another. Without realising it, she had returned to the park and was walking along a path where the interlaced branches of the chestnut trees formed a canopy overhead. A breeze sprang up and the fallen leaves scattered around until they came to rest in soft drifts along the edge of the path. A young mother was wheeling a high-sided pram. The baby gurgled and its mother cooed back. Despite her tension, Elzunia smiled. Wars had been lost and won, maps of the world had been redrawn, old nations had vanished and new ones had emerged, and, in the process, millions had been senselessly slaughtered, but the chain of life was infinite, like the stars.
Babies were a symbol of hope for the future but what kind of world would that baby grow up in? Would it find out how easily evil men can convince their followers to commit atrocities? Would it learn anything from all the courage and all the cruelty that the war had exposed? And would that baby ever comprehend the excruciating complexity of being human? Or would the war soon recede into the shadows of a distant and irrelevant past so that its lessons would one day have to be learnt all over again?
Turning into a dappled alley of beech trees, Elzunia sat down on a bench and breathed in the musty smell of the leaves. The light that slanted through the trees shone with a brilliance that made her catch her breath. It was the kind of intense golden light that artists painted to depict a sacred moment or to suggest an impending miracle. She looked around, almost expecting a revelation that would imbue the scene with some monumental significance. But there was only the rustling of the leaves, and, when she turned her face up to the sky, she saw that each bough of the massive beech was swaying to its own rhythm.
A young man walked past, whistling a tune she recognised. It was a lovesong from a Lehar operetta that her father used to whistle while shaving. An exquisite pain gripped her chest. The beauty of the melody became enmeshed with recollections of her parents and the world that now lived only in her memory. She closed her eyes and her mind became a kaleidoscope of faces, trees, birds and music. She could hear Andrzej saying, ‘Life is a brief gift.’ Time stopped and she felt her soul floating past the treetops towards the sky.
Being alive was extraordinary. Life was an impenetrable mystery, a network of beauty and ugliness, wonders and horrors that were intertwined and interconnected, where happiness trembled on the brink of disaster, and the good could not be untangled from the bad.
As though awakening from a trance, Elzunia looked around in wonder. Something mystical had brushed her soul and she sat very still so as not to smudge its delicate fingerprints. The moment passed. The conflict and hesitation were gone, and, in their place, she felt a calm sense of purpose.
As she rose, she looked back to capture the moment and imprint it on her memory but the light had lost its incandescence and that corner of the park no longer glowed with an ethereal light.
Elzunia started walking towards St John’s Hospital until
she could no longer contain herself and broke into a run. For the first time, she felt that the war was over.
Acknowledgments
Nocturne is a work of fiction based on historical events that took place during and immediately after World War II. Although most of the characters are fictional, I have taken the liberty of interpolating several historical figures into my story. They are Adam Czerniakow, the controversial president of the Jewish Council inside the Warsaw Ghetto, the famous pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman, and the heroic educationalist Dr Janusz Korczak, who could have survived but chose to die together with the children in his charge.
Some of the characters in Nocturne have been partly inspired by remarkable people I have met over the years. One of them is H., whose courage and fearlessness during the darkest days of the war have made an indelible impression on me. Among others who have generously shared their stories with me are Cesia Glazer, Lena Goldstein, Yola Schneider, Dora Grynberg, Leo Zettel and the late David Landau.
Emeritus Professor Jerzy Zubricki, who played an important part in some of the events I have described, was kind enough to read sections of this manuscript and provide me with valuable details.
Joanna Kalowski took time to help me translate some phrases into German.
I’d like to acknowledge the following authors whose books I have found invaluable sources of information. Lynne Olson and Stanley Gould for their enthralling account of the plight of Polish airmen who served in the RAF during World War II, A Question of Honor; Jan Karski for his illuminating memoir, Story of a Secret State; and Barbara Engelking and Jacek Leociak for their meticulously researched The Warsaw Ghetto: a Guide to the Perished City.
Other books and memoirs that have given me unique insights into life during this tragic period are Justyna’s Diary by Gusta Draenger, The Ghetto Fighters by Marek Edelman, Caged by David Landau, A Chronicle of the Years of War and Occupation by Ludwik Landau, Participants and Witnesses of the Warsaw Uprising, edited by Janusz Zawodny, Letters from Belsen 1945 by Muriel Knox Doherty, Rising ’44 by Norman Davies, A Chronicle of the Fighting Capital by Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, Janek: A Gentile in the Warsaw Ghetto by Janek Kostanski, The Cigarette Sellers by Joseph Ziemian, and Off the Record: the Life and Times of Muriel Knox Doherty, edited by R. Lynette Russell.
Living with an author whose mind is fixed on uprisings, invasions, bombing raids and battles for three whole years can test a spouse’s understanding and forbearance, but my dear Michael has dealt with this as he deals with everything else — with grace, good humour and generosity. As always, he was my first reader, and I’m very grateful for his understanding, literary taste and helpful suggestions.
It’s a pleasure to work with the supportive team at HarperCollins. I’m especially grateful to my publisher, Linda Funnell, for her enthusiasm and sensitivity. Jo Butler has been a meticulous and thoughtful editor, whose probing questions have enhanced this manuscript.
I’m extremely fortunate in having Selwa Anthony as my agent. I appreciate her empathy and wisdom, and the fact that, no matter how busy she is, she always has time to listen and advise.
P.S. Ideas, interviews & features included in a new section…
About the author
Meet the author
Favourite ten books
About the book
The critical eye
Q&A
Discussion questions
Read on
Have you read?
Find out more
About the author
Meet the author
DIANE WAS born in Poland and arrived in Australia in 1948.
At the age of seven she decided to become a writer. Her first article, about teaching at a Blackboard Jungle school in London, was published in The Australian Women’s Weekly in 1965. Diane subsequently became a freelance journalist, and over three thousand of her investigative articles, personal experience stories, profiles and travel stories have been published in newspapers and magazines such as Reader’s Digest, Vogue, The Bulletin, Harper’s Bazaar, The Australian, the Sydney Morning Herald, Good Weekend and The Age. Her articles have also appeared in major publications in the UK, Canada, Poland, Hong Kong, Hungary, Holland and South Africa.
Over the years she has received numerous awards for journalism, including the Pluma de Plata awarded by the Government of Mexico for the best article written about that country, and the Gold Award given by the Pacific Asia Tourist Association. In 1993 she received an award for an investigative article about Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. In 1998, she received the George Munster Award for Independent Journalism.
In 1998 her first book, Mosaic, a Chronicle of Five Generations was published by Random House with the help of a grant from the Australia Council. This memoir was nominated for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction as well as for the National Biography Award. In 2001 it was published in the United States and Canada by St Martin’s Press, and was selected as one of the year’s best memoirs by Amazon.com. In May 2009, Mosaic will be re-issued by HarperCollins.
In 2000 Diane received her second grant from the Australia Council. The Voyage of their Life, the Story of the SS Derna and its Passengers was published by HarperCollins, and was shortlisted in the New South Wales Premier’s Literary Awards.
Her first novel, Winter Journey, was published by HarperCollins in 2004 and was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers’ Literary Award. It has been published in Poland. In 2010 it will be published in Israel.
Diane is married to Sydney medico and photographer Michael Armstrong, has two children, Justine and Jonathan, and three grand-daughters, Sarah, Maya and Allie. She is a member of the Australian Society of Authors, the Society of Women Writers, the NSW Writers’ Centre and Sydney PEN International.
Diane Armstrong’s favourite ten books:
1. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.
I love the vitality of Dickens’s characters and his brilliant plots. The irony at the heart of this novel about arrogance and self-deception is very powerful.
2. The First Circle by Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
This is a devastating description of life under the Soviet system, and has a masterly plot that leads to its inevitable conclusion.
3. If This is a Man by Primo Levi.
This is a stark memoir of the author’s experiences at Auschwitz and is told in spare, objective and compelling language.
4. The Long Voyage by Jorge Semprun.
I have been profoundly moved by this Spanish writer’s insights about the choices that we can make, even in extreme situations.
5. An Evil Cradling by Brian Keenan.
This is an inspiring memoir written by a man who was kidnapped and held captive by extremists in Lebanon, but who never lost his courage or humanity.
6. The Diaries of Anaïs Nin by Anaïs Nin.
I am beguiled by her lyrical writing and willingness to reveal herself.
7. The Roots of Heaven by Romain Gary.
This beautifully written novel about an idealist who tries to save the elephants of Africa from extinction resonated with me when I read it many years ago.
8. In My Father’s Court by Isaac Bashevis Singer.
These vignettes of life in the home of his father are written with Singer’s usual acerbic wit and probing insight into human nature.
9. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller.
A black satire about the American armed forces during World War II, this is a hilarious, original and also shocking look at war and those who find ways to profit from it. Joseph Heller has been one of my favourite writers ever since I read Catch-22, so when he offered to write a comment for the jacket of my first book, Mosaic, I couldn’t believe my good fortune.
10. A Severed Head by Iris Murdoch.
I think Iris Murdoch was one of the twentieth century’s best novelists and I was delighted by the unexpected twists and turns of this particular incisive novel of hers.
About the book
The critical eye
Alan Gold from Good Reading declared that ‘Nocturne … is an extraordinary, complex and compelling book … Diane Armstrong is one of the most important writers in Australia today.’
The Age admired the way the author made a little-known part of World War II history accessible to readers in a page-turning, fast-paced style: ‘Easy reading, racy … Diane Armstrong’s Nocturne is in the category of blockbuster with extra heart. The stories of the role played by young women in the Warsaw revolt are extraordinary. Through her central character, Elzunia, she explicitly points the story with resonances from Gone with the Wind. Armstrong keeps us turning the pages and may well introduce a new readership to a story that must keep on being told.’
Australian Jewish News also recognised the blockbuster and filmic quality of Nocturne: ‘I found myself replaying the scenes in the book like a film reel in my mind … Nocturne is one of those novels that will leave you reading into the night and will stay with you, like the notes of an unforgettable melody, long after you’ve read the last line.’
Sharon Ellison, writing for MEAP Careers, gave the book a wholehearted endorsement: ‘If you’re looking for a book that really leaves you thinking about life and its transience, then Nocturne is a have-to read … I found this book very hard to put down … The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, and later the Warsaw uprising of 1944 have not received a great deal of publicity, yet they were integral parts of Poland’s history. Nocturne offers a great read for fans of history, or of dramatic or romantic novels. Although it is quite long, every word is worthwhile.’
Australian Bookseller + Publisher acknowledged the depth of Diane Armstrong’s research in writing about the Ghetto and Warsaw Uprisings: ‘Like Geraldine Brooks, Diane Armstrong’s historical research is expertly woven into the fabric of a fictional tale, providing an engrossing “faction” of heroism and resilience which will appeal to both fans of fictional dramatic/romantic sagas, as well as lovers of insightful history’ while Australian Book Review admired her ability to re-create the despair, terror and hope of those involved in the uprisings in her writing: ‘A gallant and gut-wrenching story. The accounts of the two uprisings … are dramatic and heartbreaking … superb reading.’