When I was a kid I made a shield from plywood, grabbed a stick in the woods, and rode my imaginary steed, a knight of the Round Table in search of dragons to slay. The old stories told by Geoffrey of Monmouth, Sir Walter Scott, and Alfred Tennyson, retold by Mark Twain, John Steinbeck, Mary Stewart, and Bernard Cornwell, made chivalry and knighthood part of early reading. To my young mind knights were in and around the British Isles. Later Richard Wagner sang of knights in Germany. But who ever heard of knights in Poland? Henryk Sienkiewicz did and he wrote thousands of pages of brilliant prose to tell their story to the world.
Henryk Sienkiewicz was born in 1846 not far from Warsaw. His family was sufficiently prosperous to provide him an abbot tutor and a French governess. His deep Christian faith was strengthened by challenges of professors and fellow students at Warsaw University. Freed from studies words began to flow from his pen. Most of his early work addressed the philosophical conundrums he saw about him. Trips to Paris and across the United States to California broadened his scope. Repeated attacks on and partitioning of his country sent his fellow Poles all over the world, providing subject matter for an observant young writer. It was in the 1880’s that the moralist turned historian. He saw the sad history of Poland with its dismemberments, struggles with neighbors, and uprising against oppressors as overshadowing its glory days. His trilogy of historical fiction By Fire and the Sword, The Deluge, and Pan Michael celebrates the life and trials of Poland in the 17th Century. The Teutonic Knights takes us to Poland of the 14th Century with all of the glory of knighthood, chivalry, and striving to maintain a national identity in a feudal society. Henryk Sienkiewicz became the bard of the Polish people. His pictures of the glory which was Poland made him the country’s great patriot, consoling the people, and giving them a faith in the future.
While in Rome he saw this inscription carved in a small chapel: “Quo Vadis, Domine?” Translated, “Where are you going, Lord?” referring to the legend of Saint Peter who, fleeing the persecutions of Nero, met Jesus going toward Rome. When Peter asked where Jesus was going he replied as Peter was shirking his duties as shepherd it would be necessary to be crucified again. Quo Vadis? arrived at the perfect time, coinciding with the neo-Christian movement in Europe, known in the United States as “The Great Awakening”. The reading public was thirsty for a tale in which faith in God would triumph over godless civilization. In very explicit terms Sienkiewicz glorified the victory of the martyred Christian’s simple faith over the overwhelming power of the corrupt Roman Empire. The book was an instant success, which when translated gave its author international status.
It is a tribute to this 1905 Nobel laureate that 115 years later all of his books are for sale on Amizon.com and two copies of the film version of Quo Vadis? are available on Netflix. I choose The Teutonic Knights which was written after Quo Vadis? A copy was available in the local library. In addition I read The Lighthouse –keeper and Yanko the Musician. I bought a used copy of Quo Vadis? published by a conservative Christian group. I had already read the other works and the translation insulted the work of this brilliant writer. I was further offended by a very clumsy attempt to insert dogma through annotation. I do not need passages explained to me, especially in the light of a specific view of history. I gave the book away and hope the recipient enjoys it. Instead, like a high school English Lit student, I ordered the movie from Netflix. I will watch it after I finish this article.
The Teutonic Knights (also titled Knights of the Cross) is everything I expected. The good guys, all Polish, are beyond reproach. The bad guys, all German, are pure evil. It is a true epic; the edition I read was 787 pages. Written in at a time when Poland was partitioned by Russia, Austria, and German Prussia, The Teutonic Knights is a very obvious shot at the latter. The subject is the fight of the Poles and Lithuanians against the Teutonic Knights who were originally charged with bringing Christianity to what was considered by Rome a pagan area of Europe. Although the book shows pagan practice just under the surface, the Teutonic Knights had over stayed their welcome, corrupted by the easy life which power and property bought. Full of chivalric love, acts of loyalty, and deeds of bravado the book ends in 1410 at the Battle of Tannenberg where the Teutonic Knights are repelled in bloody combat. Of course, after many brushes with death and a constant adherence to his knightly code the hero, Zbyszko, marries the beautiful and faithful Jagienka, they have three sons, and live happily ever after. Good stuff and very easy to get lost in.
Occasionally the line between prose and poetry gets blurred. Such is the case with the novella The Light-house Keeper. This short work sang to my soul. Maybe it is because like the primary character I too have wandered and came to appreciate here only when I was there. An old Pole applies for the position of lighthouse keeper in Aspinwall, near Panama. All of his life he has wandered the world, mostly as a solder but also as miner, farmer, and whaler. Life has not been good, some quirk of fate always forces him to move on. He came to the absolute isolation of a lighthouse on an island to rest and here to die. And for many months he delighted in the isolation, never failing in his duties. Once, in a news paper he noticed the formation of a Polish-American Society and sent a small amount of his unneeded salary. As a gift they send him books of poetry in his native language. Through the language of his youth, which he had not heard in 40 years, he is transported to a place he had forgotten. He filled with love of country which can only be felt by those who have been separated for a long period, he became so absorbed he forgot to light the lighthouse and a ship ran aground. He lost his job in paradise but he found paradise in his soul where lay his heritage. If you read nothing else by Sienkiewicz read The Lighthouse-Keeper.
If Yanko the Musician doesn’t break your heart it is made of stone. This tale is straight out of Charles Dickens. A deformed child is born to poverty. Rejected and abused, his only happiness is the music he hears everywhere. One night he passes a tavern and hears a fiddle. Overwhelmed, he makes an unsatisfactory replica from a piece of slate and string. At the manor house the lackey has a fiddle which he plays for the waiting-maid. Yanko hides to hear the music. One night the lackey leaves the fiddle in the kitchen and Yanko succumbs to temptation to touch it. He is caught and accused of theft. As punishment the counsel turns him over to the thuggish night watchman who flogs him to death. His last words are, “Mother, will the Lord God give me a real fiddle in Heaven?” It is a real tear jerker.
For a whole lot of reasons, including the length of his work, Henryk Sienkiewicz took six weeks to read and digest. It was well worth it. I hope in the future to get back to some of his other works. He moved high on my list of favorite authors. Please dear reader go to the trouble of finding The Lighthouse-keeper. It is well worth the search.
Now it is off to Northern Tuscany and the poet Glosué Carducci, time Gieacchino Rossini and pears and cheese with good strong coffee.
No comments:
Post a Comment