Customer Reviews

Accompanist

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I'm disappointed that this book is out of print, as it is one of the most beautifully written and translated works I have ever read. It is a story of what people who do for other people or because of other people and the power of personality. It is also a love story, but of an unocnventional type. The narrator/protagonist is not someone that I would normally find interesting, but the author illuminates her life and gives us moments and glimpses of choices that the narrator makes wisely or unwisely and their consequences. Berberova's prose gives us insights into this character using metaphors that have an almost formal beauty and achieves that "aha" moment when the reader finally regards the item, action, or person in a never before seen way.

This is a marvelous jewel from an author I hadn't read before. It has been a delightful surprise. Exquisite prose, a thick plot despite this is a novella, complex characters. I can only describe the book's ambiance as a mixture between Romanticism and Existentialism. I will definitely look for more books by this Russian woman.

Here is the story of Sonechka, the accompanist of the Russian singer Maria Nicholaevna Travina, who is beautiful and loved by everyone in general and by two men in particular. Sonechka becomes Travshina's accompanist and something close to her servant and it is clear that she is living through Travina, who makes sure to prevent Sonechka from becoming close to others. Sonechka goes to Paris along with Travina's entourage, and there a tragic love triangle develops which the narrator observes with envy, desire, jealousy and love. Berberova's novels during this period are about the contrast between those people who live in the moment and are happy, like Travina, and those who observe it and are miserable, like Sonechka. Here, the Sonechka is on the outside of life and is observing it from afar. The narrative frame makes it clear that now she is really on the outside of life. The writing is clear and without self-pity or affectation and sometimes beautiful.
This is definitely worth reading.