Short Biography
Władysław Szpilman (1911-2000) was a talented young pianist of the 1930’s. As a successful pianist and composer, Szpilman’s life was dramatically disrupted by the German invasion of Poland in September 1939. The Nazi racial ideology that resulted in the institution of ghettos and death camps substantially impacted on his career, his work, and his family. Non-Aryans who hid Jews put their lives at risk. These Upstanders played a pivotal role in Szpilman’s survival.
Szpilman was born in Sosnowiec, Poland on December 5, 1911. He began his studies at the Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw from 1926-1930, and in 1931 continued at the Academy of Arts in Berlin, Germany. After the Nazis assumed power in 1933, Szpilman returned to Warsaw and became a well-known piano soloist specializing in classical and popular music. In April 1935 he joined the Polish Radio where he worked performing classical and jazz pieces on the piano. His own compositions for orchestras, films and piano became very popular.
By 1939, Szpilman was a well-known celebrity throughout Poland. When the Germans invaded Warsaw on September 23, he was playing a live broadcast of Chopin’s Nocturne in C-sharp Minor. The German bombing of the studio forced him to stop playing. His family already lived in what became the Jewish Ghetto and therefore, did not need to relocate. In the ghetto, he found work playing in cafes to support his parents, brother, and two sisters.
In 1942, he reported to the Umschlagplatz for deportation and a member of the Jewish Police recognized him and pulled him from the line. His entire family was deported to Treblinka and none of them survived. Szpilman worked as a laborer in the ghetto and helped smuggle weapons for the ghetto uprising.
In February 1943, with help from thirty friends from Polish Radio or fellow musicians, Szpilman sneaked out of the Warsaw Ghetto and hid on the Polish side. In April, he watched the Ghetto Uprising from his place of hiding. He evaded capture several times. Hunger and starvation were constant companions, and Szpilman’s body withered to skin and bone.
In August 1944, Szpilman was hiding in an abandoned building on Aleja Niepodległości Street 223. In November he was discovered there by a German officer Captain Wilm Hosenfeld who brought him food, a warm coat and other supplies until the Germans retreated from Warsaw. His act of kindness demonstrated that humanity and empathy could exist even within the enemy ranks.
In his first broadcast in 1945 after the German surrender, Szpilman played the Chopin composition exactly where he had left off during the bombing in 1939. From 1945-1961 he was the Director of Popular Music at Polish Radio while at the same time continuing to perform in Poland and around the world. He retired in 1986 to continue composing. Władysław Szpilman was 88 when he died of natural causes in Warsaw in July 2000.
Relevance and Memory
Władysław Szpilman composed music throughout his life, even in the Warsaw Ghetto. His volume of work included about 500 songs, 100 of which are well known and about 40 songs for children. Most of his work was only known in Poland as the Cold War division prevented his compositions from reaching listeners in Western Europe and beyond. His son would later compile his work for release on CDs in the late 90’s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Szpilman wrote and released his first book, The Death of a City, in 1946 but it was censored by Soviet interests. For example, Hosenfeld, the benevolent German officer that protected him was made Austrian. His writing provides a first-hand account of the Warsaw Ghetto and the destruction of the Polish Jewish population. Szpilman’s son published an updated version of his memoir and the first in a German translation called The Miraculous Survival and in English The Pianist and would be published in 35 languages to great popularity.
His memoir inspired Polish-French film maker Roman Polanski to direct a screen adaptation that closely followed the book. In 2002 his film adaptation of The Pianist won numerous awards worldwide. (Polanski himself was a survivor who had escaped the Kraków Ghetto.)
