Customer Reviews

The Song Before it is Sung

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book has the most off-putting first page I think I have ever read. Never mind: it quickly gripped my attention. It is quite avowedly about the relationship between Isaiah Berlin, the Jewish Oxford philosopher, and Adam von Trott, the German aristocrat who had been a Rhodes scholar in Oxford and, while there, had been a close friend of Berlin's. Von Trott was a patriot for the "real" Germany, abhorring the Nazis, but feeling deeply the humiliating loss of German territories at Versailles. Back in his own country, he worked first as a lawyer, joined the Nazi Party because he had to, and then joined the German Foreign Office. Hoping to avoid war, he had secret contacts with the British ministers encouraging them to stand firm against Hitler. When war came and the Nazi regime unleashed its full brutality, he took part in the 1944 plot to assassinate Hitler, and was hanged.

It escapes me why Cartwright indulges in the nonsense of calling the protagonists Elya Mendel and Axel von Gottberg, and I do not intend to follow his example. He gives different names to several other historical characters: to Maurice Bowra, the Warden of Wadham (here called Lionel Wray and made the Warden of All Souls); to the American Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter (here called Michael Hamburger); to the Socialist Hans Leber (here called Franz Liebherr); possibly to Pastor Schönfeld (Pastor Schönborn); and to von Trott's wife. So one wonders which of the other people in the book are hidden behind false names and which are simply Cartwright's inventions. It was Bonhoeffer and Schönfeld, not von Trott, who contacted Bishop Bell of Chichester in Stockholm in 1942. There are evocative descriptions of the von Trott family estate in Mecklenburg, but in fact the von Trott's family estate was in Hessen, and Cartwright says in his acknowledgments that the Mecklenburg estates he visited in researching the book belonged to the family of Count von der Schulenburg, another of the 1944 plotters against Hitler. And Henry Hardy, who has spent a life-time working on Berlin's papers, writes that von Trott's execution was not filmed, although the recovery of this film is one of the climaxes of the book. Several reviews have criticized the liberties taken by this fictional account not only of such details but also of the relationship between the two men, liberties some of which go beyond the imaginative reconstructions that we find in many excellent historical novels. I think the reader should know all this. He can then perhaps put that knowledge behind him, and read the book as a work of fiction inspired by but not reliably based on historical facts. This will be difficult if he knows the material well.

In 1934, back in Germany, von Trott had written a letter to the Manchester Guardian protesting that he could see no discrimination against the Jews; and of course this letter had deeply upset Berlin. It did not totally destroy his friendship for von Trott, but he could never trust the latter's protestations that he was not a Nazi - not least perhaps because von Trott advocated that the best way of helping the Germans to get rid of Hitler was for the Western Powers to restore to Germany the German lands that had been taken from her at Versailles. So he was sceptical when von Trott urged the Americans to help the German opposition and warned Frankfurter that von Trott could not be trusted. (For what actually happened, see Michael Ignatieff's biography of Isaiah Berlin, p.76). The Allies never did trust or help the German opposition, and the plot against Hitler went ahead without them. When it failed, von Trott (in this version) could have escaped abroad, but felt `a sacrifice is due to Germany' (p.209). He awaited arrest and paid the horrible price.

The story of Berlin and von Trott (with much more emphasis on von Trott than on Berlin) is intercut with the story, in 2002, of the wholly invented character, Conrad Senior. He is a former pupil of Berlin who had died seven years earlier, and he has been entrusted by his guilt-ridden former tutor with his papers, with the implicit task of disproving the rumour that, by rousing suspicions about von Trott with the Allies, he bore some responsibility for von Trott's death. But Berlin (in this version) would also like to have it cleared up whether von Trott had `died a German patriot or as someone who wanted to atone for the sins visited on the Jews, on Mendel's people. For Mendel that was the issue when all else was forgotten.' (p.207).

Half of Conrad's mind is on these tasks, while the other half is on the fraught nature of his marriage: his wife despises Conrad's undisciplined musings, the fact that he dwells so much in the world of ideas, and in particular his preoccupation with a dead philosopher in whom, according to her, nobody is now much interested. I can't say I found Conrad's disconnected musings about life either particularly interesting or his stream-of-consciousness associations between his quest and the events in his personal life as significant as I think Cartwright intended them to be. There are the obligatory sex scenes (also one invented for Isaiah Berlin) without which no novel these days seems to be complete.

There are several references to the contrast between Berlin as a man of thought and von Trott as a man of action. Near the end of the book, when Conrad has seen the film of von Trott's trial and of his sickening execution, he indulges in an extraordinary tirade against Berlin, when just a few pages back he had `loved him like a father'.

For the craft of story-telling and for the examination of the moral questions involved, I would give this book four stars; as a historical novel, however, two at best.

Wonderful book, justly praised as a masterpiece by LA Times and amazing
by National Post. Do read this. It's about the War and two friends, one German one English. Utterly moving and convincing, on love, patriotism,
the war, and about obsession. How can anyone write a novel this good and
not be totally famous? Please, please give yourself a treat, as the Wall St Journal said.

The novel is, at its core , a beautifully imagined take on the life of Adam von Trott, one of the July 20th plotters against Hitler. Von Trott exemplifies personal bravery, patriotism and commitment. While von Trott's patriotism and mystical inclination leads to a certain amount of self delusion, his involvement in the plot makes complete sense, even if he may have fooled himself into overstating the likely benefits of success. The novel is also an account of von Trott's friendship with Isaiah Berlin, but this is far less successful, principally because the Berlin of the novel is such an ordinary person, regardless of his intellectual attainments.

The account is supposedly written by a former student of Berlin, Conrad Senior, to whom Berlin leaves his papers relating to von Trott and their friendship. At various times in the novel Senior asks himself what Berlin hopes he will accomplish with this material, and comes up with various answers, but I believe the true answer is obvious: Berlin hopes that von Trott will receive his due.

The writing is quite good, and I also enjoyed the relationship between Conrad and his wife. The wife is most definitely sympathetic even as she ends their marriage.

"Where is the song before it is sung?"

Justin Cartwright, in THE SONG BEFORE IT IS SUNG, argues, "Nowhere is the answer. One creates a song by singing it, by composing it." He expands his scope: "So, too, life is created by those who live it step by step."

In other words, does a human being make his own fate? Or do the constraints of his character and forces greater than himself constrain and even dictate his destiny?

THE SONG BEFORE IT IS SUNG would try to convince us that life is, quite starkly and unrelentingly, what it is and nothing more...that it has no meaning beyond just being. Yet, it protests too much. And it offers a character study -- that of "Axel, Count von Gottberg, a noble son of Mecklenburg and a true patriot" -- that challenges this hypothesis.

Von Gottberg is a fictional representation of a real German, Adam von Trott, whom Hitler had executed for collaboration in the famous and failed assassination plot at "Wolf's Lair" in Rastenburg, Prussia. Von Trott was friends with Isaiah Berlin. They hit a strained period when von Trott wrote a letter to an English newspaper in 1934 claiming anti-Semitism did not exist in the courts in Hesse where he lawyered. According to later assertions by mutual friends, as early as 1935 Berlin accepted von Trott's regret over the letter, and their friendship resumed.

In THE SONG BEFORE IT WAS SUNG, however, Berlin's fictional alter ego, Elya Mendel, is a less understanding man. He considers von Gottberg's letter evidence that the Count is a Nazi, whether von Gottberg admits it or not. Mendel and another Jewish friend write to U.S. Supreme Court Justice "Hamburger" (alias for actual Justice Frankfurter) to warn that diplomat von Gottberg should not be trusted or assisted when he seeks support in Washington D.C. for a negotiated peace.

Mendel, a scholar who remained in Oxford after he and von Gottberg were young students there together, is a man dedicated to ideas. He is a secular, insular man who believes unshakably that nothing von Gottberg can do will (or should) change the course of the war. Mendel demands abject surrender from Germany, and he sees clearly that the British and American politicians share this goal. He does, several times, urge von Gottberg to flee Germany, convinced that the German will lose his life one way or the other by staying. Despite this concern, Mendel vacillates over what he thinks von Gottberg's truest, deepest motivations might be. He isn't sure von Gottberg knows himself.

But Hegelian von Gottberg harbors no such doubts about himself. He is a man whose character and upbringing as a member of the German aristocracy propel him to serve the "secret" the "sacred" Germany that yearns for a dignified existence sans Hitler and his clique. He is a man of action who cannot leave Germany to its own devices. He sees himself and Germans of like mind (such as Colonel von Stauffenberg, who actually placed the bomb in "Wolf's Lair") as servants and saviors chosen by destiny, by providence, by the spirit of his homeland. He will not heed Mendel's rational pleadings because he is driven by Something Greater -- a Teutonic, arguably mystical, bond with his people and his country. In 1944, the 35-yer-old Count (along with many co-conspirators) pays the ultimate price for his commitment and his principles.

The book's chief narrator, Conrad Senior, is a present-day dreamer to whom Mendel, in old age, bequethed his papers. Senior is obsessed with von Gottberg's gruesome death, and with clarifying the circumstances of the Mendel/von Gottberg rift. His own life is a shambles, and he struggles to make sense of both bygone times and the press of Now...which is still being impacted by the past.

THE SONG BEFORE IT IS SUNG, then, is a historical novel that doesn't entirely adhere to known facts. It is however, a beautifully evoked, sometimes haunting, rumination on friendship, sexuality as basic impetus, convictions, and love. Also on the value of patriotism in its various shades, relations between Germans and Jews...and men and women, and whether life operates transparently or via forces beyond individual control. Ambiguously, the novel's thesis that people create their own fate is both proven and disproven. The irony highlights the rich complexity of our human existence.

[Here are two links for readers who would like further historical perspective and commentary on the book:
http://www.newstatesman.com/200703120045

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/599 ]

Justin Cartwright is little known in America which is a shame because his novels have a self-assured mastery that makes some of his better known British contemporaries appear callow by comparison. The Song Before It is Sung is a beautifully crafted work that uses the friendship of an Oxford don (a lightly fictionalized Isaiah Berlin) and a German aristocrat to explore the ways in which history props us up and pins us down.

Elya Mendel and Axel von Gottberg meet at Oxford in the 1930s and become friends with differing views on history and its effects. Mendel believes there is no larger purpose to life that the meaning we make in the here and now. He's wary of the ways that big ideas about human perfectibility are used to shape the lives of actual human beings. Axel believes we are carried along by historical imperatives. He sees himself as both the product of and standard bearer for an historical Germanness rooted in the land, the polity and a mystical sense of Teutonic purpose. As Hitler rises to power, Axel's faith in his beloved Germany gets put to the test. Elya sees clearly where Hitler is headed, and the friendship ruptures over Axel's attempt to reconcile the "true" Germany from the one falling in to goosestep behind the Fuhrer.

Long after the war, as he nears the end of his life, Mendel asks one of his former students to take the letters between him and von Gottberg and make something of them. This student, Conrad Senior, gropes his way through the thickets of correspondence, unsure what his beloved teacher actually intended. Conrad has his own problems. His physician wife increasingly views him as an aimless dilettante who lacks the will to bring his thoughts and opinions out of his head into the real world. She tells him she's fallen in love with another doctor and is leaving him.

With his personal life in shambles, Conrad digs deeper into the past, uncovering complex relationships between Elya, Axel and two female cousins. Axel believes you can never lose contact with someone you love, a belief he translates into serial adultery. His unwillingness to let go of anything he loves ultimately leads Axel to tragedy. Even though he believes Hitler is a disastrous evil visited on the German people, he won't abandon Germany. He joins Claus von Stauffenberg's attempt to assassinate the Fuhrer. The plot fails, and von Gottberg is arrested, tortured and hanged. The hanging was filmed for Hitler, and Conrad finds an old German who retains the film. Viewing it becomes a life altering event for Conrad, upending his preconceived notions of Mendel and Von Gottberg, along with his easy assumptions about the life of the mind.

One of the pleasures in reading Cartwright is how he stands at a distance from his characters, seeing the big picture quite clearly, in a way that could be a setup for irony or satire. But then he moves in close, bringing such empathy , compassion and fine-grained detail to the observation that you end up responding emotionally to the characters' plights. This technique allows him to write novels of ideas that propel the reader forward though their warmth and humanity. Cartwright is a major novelist who has been much recognized and rewarded across the pond. He deserves a wider audience here.

This is just an outstanding novel, well written, based on solid research, and reflective of a high degree of narrative skill by the author. Fiction based upon actual events and real folks is a difficult thing to write well, because the reader can be left in confusion as to what is truth and what is fiction. Skillfully melding the two into an effective whole is a goal not often met--but it surely is here. The central element of the story is the relationship between a character that is based on the Oxford don Sir Isaiah Berlin (1909-1997) and a German Rhodes Scholar during the 1930's, who in actuality was Adam Von Trott. The author has given them different names, for reasons that elude me, but has a note in the back explaining all this. The dynamic of their relationship was that Von Trott returned to Nazi Germany and wrote a letter to a British newspaper which some, including Berlin, thought was trying to dispel any contention that Jews were being mishandled in the German courts. Estrangement from his British friends, including Berlin in particular, resulted.

Later Von Trott, then employed in the German foreign ministry, participates with Count Von Stauffenberg (soon to be portrayed by Tom Cruise in the forthcoming "Valkyrie") in the 1944 plot to assasinate Hitler, which of course fails, and he and the other conspirators are executed. The author is particularly careful in his handling of this episode to structure it in accordance with the published accounts we have of this important episode. The central theme of the novel is that Berlin leaves his papers relating to Von Trott to a later student of his, to organize and publish. The novel recounts his efforts to do further research and reconstruct the dimensions of this relationship. This is all fine; unfortunately the author has included a subplot about the central character and his wife who are having marital difficulties, which I think hampers (but not too badly) the flow of the novel.

One can check the novel against the facts as known. For example, in the recent collection of Berlin letters, "Flourishing: 1928-1946" (also reviewed on Amazon) there are not only letters between the two, but a picture of Von Trott, as well as an account which Berlin wrote as a tribute to him in 1986, on the fortieth anniversary of his execution. The author has treated this painful episode in Berlin's life with sensitivity, and out of it has spun a great novel that is just a pleasure to read.

It may stray somewhat from history, but it is a novel, and despite not adhering strictly to the facts of the friendship between Berlin and Von Trott, The Song Before it is Sung offers a very moving, unusual take on German nationalism during WW2. Beautifully written, engaging and worth owning.

I simply did not enjoy this book. I had to keep forcing myself to pick it up to read it. The main problem was that I never really grew to care about any of the characters. The female characters in particular all seemed to blend together. I liked the writing style, but the story itself (in my opinion) was not engaging at all.