Ignorance

(The November Uprising)

I grew up in a town that was heavily Polish. Where I live now it is fairly common to hear Polish spoken on the street or in stores; so common as to not even notice.  My knowledge of Poland centers mainly in the events of the last century and of WWII so, in a nutshell, I'm simply ignorant of a prior heritage and history that has and is all around me and has been for half a century.



written in 1830, Chopin was 20 and about to
graduate from the Warsaw Conservatory

 

As a musician by education and heart, I studied Chopin, the pianist and composer, and thought of him as the forefront, go-to guy of Polish music and we learned from our texts that he was born in 1810 and left Poland for Paris in 1830, was involved with the writer George Sand ("Guard well within yourself that treasure, kindness. Know how to give without hesitation, how to lose without regret, how to acquire without meanness.)  We mostly studied his "etudes" (studies) as something of an encyclopedia of piano techniques.

Why he left Poland wasn't mentioned in our highly romantic, highly prejudiced texts, nor did we learn that there really wasn't a Poland in 1830 as we think of it, but a divided state, part Russian, part Germanic and part Austrian. The Russian part (where Chopin lived) went in revolt (the November Uprising) and Chopin was off, essentially into exile, as did the regions cream of the intellectual crop.  There is much more to it than that and from a few hours reading, my capital "I" ignorance is showing so I'll stop writing here until I get all this history into my mind.

We all need to do that some, you know. When you find a time, or subject, about which you know little, instead of the easy way - well - dig in and find out stuff. A little music, a quiet chair and lamp, and some flipping of pages may be just the ticket.  Won't hurt.