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A LIFE'S MUSIC

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Andrei Makine's Music of a Life is a slim book. It a simple story, told in a straightfoward, spare fashion. Yet within the framework of this simple story lies a profund piece of work that has an impact on the reader that, like the most beautiful music, lingers long after the last note fades into the night.

Makine, for those not familiar with his work, was born in the Soviet Union in 1958. He emigrated to France as a young man. He writes in French. (Music of a Life was nicely translated from the French by Geoffrey Strachan). At the risk of setting out what may sound like a hackneyed cliche, Makine's work for me combines the grace and elgance of the best French writers and the deep soul and conviction of the best Russian writers.

Music of a Life is set out as the re-telling of a conversation had between two strangers on a train moving slowly west from Siberia sometime around 1958, the year many thousands finally won their release from the labor camps that dotted the Soviet Far East. Two men sit together. One older man, wearing clothes that mark him as someone just released from the Gulag strikes up a comnversation with his fellow passenger. The story is set out in the voice of the other passenger. As the train moves on the older passenger and the narrator exchange slowly. At some point the older passenger, Alexe Berg, slowly sets out his life story.

In 1940, the young Alexe, a classically trained pianist of great talent and promise, was preparing for his debut recital. On approaching his family flat after the dress rehearsal he sees a pre-arranged symbol indiccating that his parents, supposedly dangerous members of the intelligentsia, had been swept up by the NKVD (pre-cursor to the KGB). Alexe makes his escape and finds himself hiding out in the Ukraine in 1941. The devastation of the Nazi invasion of the USSR in June of that year engulfs the Urkaine. Alexe comes upon the body of a dead Soviet solider, a peasant, and assumes the dead soldier's identify. Although this provides him some protection from those who might still seek his arrest, Alex realizes quickly that he must maintain this identity at all costs.

Alexe makes it through the war in one piece and, in fact, finds favor with a Soviet general, who keeps him at his side as an aide de camp during the rest of the war. Alexe's survival remains dependent upon his being thought of as a simple peasant. After the war, Alexe finds work with the general's family. The general's daughter takes a liking to the young 'peasant' soldier. Alexe becomes enamored of the daughter. The daughter, whose piano-playing skills are somehwat limited, if earnest, decides to teach the young peasant Alexe a few simple tunes on the piano. These lessons lead, inexorably, to the book's climactic moments.

The book leaves the reader (or at least it left me) contemplating the choices and compromises we sometimes make with life. It left me contemplating the question as to how much of myself would I compromise, how much of myself would I keep hidden in order to maintain some small amount of freedom in an unfree world.

As I noted at the beginning, this is a simple story, simply told. Yet, as with music, sometimes even simple combinations of notes creates a beautiful mosaic of sound. Makine has done this with the graceful combination of notes that makes up his Music of a Life.