Book

The Pianist

by Władysław Szpilman · first published 1946

The Pianist, originally published as Śmierć Miasta. Pamiętniki Władysława Szpilmana 1939–1945 ("Death of a City: Memoirs of Władysław Szpilman 1939–1945"), is a 1946 memoir by the Polish-Jewish pianist and composer Władysław Szpilman, in which he describes his life in Warsaw in occupied Poland during World War II. After being forced with his family to live in the Warsaw Ghetto, Szpilman manages to avoid deportation to the Treblinka extermination camp, and from his hiding places around the city witnesses the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943, as well as the Warsaw Uprising (the rebellion by the Polish resistance) the following year. He survives in the ruined city with the help of friends and strangers, including Wilm Hosenfeld, a German army captain who admires his piano playing. The book was edited by Jerzy Waldorff, a Polish music critic and friend of Szpilman.

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