Biography:It's not often that you come across a person who has lived through the Habsburg empire, the first World War, the second World War, the communist coup in Czechoslovakia, the establishment of the state of Israel, the Suez crisis and the Six Day War, and is still alive - but that's the case with the pianist, Alice Herz-Sommer, now aged 103.
A Garden of Eden in Hell tells the story of her life; a life lived against a backdrop of remarkable circumstances but also a life remarkable in itself.
From a German-speaking Czech Jewish family, Herz-Sommer grew up in the intellectual richness of imperial Prague, counting Mahler and Kafka as family friends. The book's initial chapters describe a world of philosophical discussions and house concerts set against traditional Jewish customs (in particular, her mother's unhappy arranged marriage looms large). Herz-Sommer's extraordinary musical talent was apparent from early on. At eight, she was practising four hours a day; at 16, she became the youngest member of the masterclass at Prague's German Musical Academy. The story of her rise to become one of the best-known pianists in the city is littered with famous names, including Rosenthal, Zemlinsky, Smetana and Ullmann.
Unfortunately, this part of the book suffers from a tendency to stray into a novelistic, even journalistic style. It opens with a servant of the family reflecting on his life as their employee - a jarring way to start an ostensibly factual biography.
The centrepiece of the book is Herz-Sommer's experience of the second World War, when she coped with the horrific hand she was dealt in unique ways. In 1942 her mother was deported to Theresienstadt concentration camp; Alice's response was to master Chopin's 24 Études, among the most difficult pieces in the piano repertoire. It was a strategy that was to serve her well as her world fell apart. It wasn't long until she herself, her husband Leopold Sommer and her six-year-old son were also in Theresienstadt.
A work camp rather than an extermination camp, Theresienstadt was used by the Nazis as a propaganda exercise to demonstrate their benevolent treatment of the Jews. Here there were practice rooms, musical instruments, makeshift auditoria. Ullmann wrote his opera, The Emperor of Atlantis, while in Theresienstadt, and Hans Krása's children's opera, Brundibár, was premiered there. During Herz-Sommer's incarceration she played more than 100 concerts for her fellow prisoners. But perhaps the most extraordinary of her achievements is that even after her husband was deported to Auschwitz - she never saw him again - she managed to provide a wonderfully happy childhood for her son.
This part of the book is also affected by the stylistic awkwardness of the early chapters. Value judgments and speculative statements about people's thoughts and feelings mar an account of what is, after all, history. It is a pity that Herz-Sommer did not write a memoir herself, as Melissa Müller and Reinhard Piechocki's lumbering narrative doesn't do justice to the fascinating story it tells.
In some ways more interesting even than the account of Theresienstadt is that of the hostility encountered by German-speaking Jews in post-war Czechoslovakia, resulting from the government's anti-German policies and the anti-Semitic legacy of the Nazis. With the communist coup in 1948 life became untenable for the regime's critics, and mother and son set out for the newly founded Israel. Many European Holocaust survivors felt isolated among Hebrew-speaking Israelis with no direct experience of the war; however, the ever-adaptable pianist lived happily in Israel for nearly 40 years before moving to London to her son's family.
The life story of Herz-Sommer makes gripping reading. The events which she survived and participated in make one wonder why this extraordinary story has not been told before. More than a biography of one remarkable woman , it is a a reflection on the subject of identity itself. The way Herz-Sommer's persecution led her Jewish heritage to predominate over the many layers of her identity as a Czech-born, German-speaking, areligious Jewish artist demonstrates the way in which labelling on the basis of race can become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Above all, however, A Garden of Eden in Hell bears witness to the redemptive, humanising power of art. In a literal sense, Herz-Sommer's music saved her life, her status as a pianist preventing her deportation to Auschwitz. On a deeper level, her music is the source of her optimism and courage. It was to music that she turned when her mother was taken away, it was music which made her life in Theresienstadt bearable, and it was through teaching music that she was able to restart her life on so many occasions. Others also drew strength and hope from her playing. It was through music that the inmates of Theresienstadt managed to retain a shred of human dignity when all other outlets were denied.
Despite its stylistic inadequacies, A Garden of Eden in Hell is a compelling read, perhaps most of all because of the awe-inspiring figure at the heart of it.
Réachbha FitzGerald is a postgraduate student of international relations. She is a pianist and teaches piano part-time.
A Garden of Eden in Hell: The Life of Alice Herz-Sommer By Melissa Müller and Reinhard Piechocki Macmillan, 326pp. £18.99