It was in my teens, when I got my own stereo and learned to play the piano and violin, that I found my way into the world of music. It was learning an instrument that opened this door, providing a deeper understanding than can be gained through passive listening. And yet I turned out to be utterly devoid of musical talent, even allowing for the fact that I was too old, by then, to be able to tap into that innate ear for music that children supposedly have. At the time, though, I can’t say I really felt the lack, because in those days I imagined that this thing, music, was merely incidental to the world, a kind of garnish. In other words, I considered it on-par with overly embellished old-fashioned clothes, romantic poetry, my weekly art class, an intricately crafted dessert, the occasional trip to the theater as a reward for good grades. I was painfully sensitive as a teenager, at the mercy of the emotions that roiled and raged within me. The music lessons bored me, so I quit—that was the way I used to act, and I’m genuinely ashamed to think of it now. I was far more interested in other, “popular” things—films, music, dance—whose mind-numbing, facile simplicity meant they could be enjoyed without any form of critical engagement. My parents didn’t know much about music themselves, and when I decided to drop my lessons in favor of learning a computer programming language, they agreed that this would be a more productive use of my time. After all, it wasn’t as though I was intending to go on to music school, and the lesson fees hadn’t exactly been cheap. My adolescence was marred with so much that was base and contemptible. In those days I had a Fischer-Dieskau record, ones by Maria Anderson and Maria Callas, and a Schubert collection (the name of the singer escapes me), as well as full-length aria collections like Madame Butterfly and La Traviata, etc. But I soon set aside that kind of music in favor of ABBA records, or the soundtracks of the latest popular films, which I borrowed from my classmates. At the time, the thing which dominated my life was neither films nor my father, but deference to the tastes and opinions of the group. Even then, I knew that La Traviata or Fischer-Dieskau were more beautiful than ABBA, but if I didn’t listen to ABBA then I couldn’t join in when my classmates enthused over their favorite songs. If I didn’t watch the films that were constantly on at the theater, with their slick editing and predictable plots, then when all the other kids could talk of nothing else I would have to pretend I just hadn’t gotten around to seeing it for some reason, and pay close attention while the others went on about how great it had been. Even worse would have been if I were to mention a scene from La Traviata, or praise Fischer-Dieskau’s voice; then, as instantaneously as a trap snapping shut, I would be ostracized, deliberately ignored, my very existence blanked out. Adolescence is a time of uncertainty and instability, and I couldn’t help but fear being condemned as old-fashioned, or as putting on airs. Worse, nothing that I learned at school gave me cause to suspect that there might be something more worthwhile than the simple, sentimental connection afforded by popular music. Being yourself was frowned upon, while ignorance was actively promoted. In those days, the authority of school was so absolute that neither I nor even my parents would dare to harbor thoughts that went against the grain. Such a thing would have been seen as undermining the good of the group, of which we were merely constituent parts. Of course, the teachers were ostensibly the ones who held the school under their sway, but they were merely the kings of the day, while the kings of the underground, the sovereigns of all darkness and terror, the merciless kings who dispensed with reason and logic, the brutal monarchs whose lust for fresh victims had all the hunger of a school of sharp-toothed piranhas, who would on no account allow their prey to go free until they were sated; they, the kings of night, already bearing in large part the natural disposition of the mob, and having this cultivated day by day, the anti-educators, were none other than the pupils.
Such a lot of time has gone by since then. Now, I have willingly taken upon myself the role of M’s protector. An inconceivably intense affection flooded through me for the tender, haughty being known as M. I closed the glass window, anxious about the prospect of M catching yet another cold. The sharp tang of petrol pervaded the interior of the old car. M had a serious allergy to many medicines, so she couldn’t take general fever remedies. Greater music, the voice said. Even before the final bar had ended, the voice repeated those same sounds, greater music. Like the raindrops which fell continuously, but seemingly without any fixed pattern, greater music, in an uncalculated extempore moment before the final notes were over, like the falling of the next raindrop while the lingering notes of the first still sound, falling to the ground beneath the clouds with no set beat, greater music, the next first notes joined the continuum. That continuous sound is called music. In winter.
Shostakovich’s Sonata for Viola and Piano is his final work, which he completed while in the hospital. He seemed to have had a strong premonition regarding his own death. According to him: We don’t simply fear death now and then; rather, our mortal lives are far more deeply threaded with its presence. At least, that’s how it seems to me . . .
2) When I first fell into the water, although I was perfectly aware that this was all really happening, it felt as though I was still stuck inside a dream. I’m walking along the road, lifting my feet with that sluggishness found in dreams, that heaviness caused by the water sloshing inside my rain boots. Neither sadness, fear, nor despair, but gravity, endless and immense, has taken hold of me. I’m wandering between the houses, their numbers painted on white signs. I must be lost. It seemed I’d experienced brutal acts but could no longer remember them. No, I was simply struck by the sense of memory’s intangibility, torn between struggling to recall certain events as something concrete, and the instinct to leave them safely in the nebulous past. But such dreams were nothing new for me, and I didn’t need to fight against the confusion; to a certain extent I actually enjoyed it. Even as the surface of the water broke my fall, I wasn’t afraid. I saw pots of limp geraniums on a windowsill, the white drapes drawn, glass dolls with scarily large pupils, and green Christmas candles. I waved. As firecrackers snapped in the middle of the road, a yellow tram went by. Benny ran barking along the water’s edge, where early bluebells bloomed between patches of unmelted snow. Nothing’s the matter, Benny. This is only a dream. But no sound emerged from my throat. Benny was barking even louder. He ran into the wood that grew by the water, gradually speeding up so that in the end he was nothing but a blurry white ball, revolving with the world’s axis as its center. What could have happened to upset him? I wanted to comfort him. My love, everything’s alright. Just wait there and I’ll come right back. There’s a good boy, my love. But Benny couldn’t hear me and streaked away, passing beyond my sight. Then the incongruous figure of a postman dressed all in yellow joined the scene. He’d parked his bicycle by the side of the road and was pressing the doorbell, holding the letters in one hand. There’s no one home, so he’ll just stick the letters in the mailbox; just as I was thinking this, I felt the first stab of the cold water, piercing the top of my head and the nape of my neck and the rim of my ears. The next moment I felt the weight of the water pull me under, cold hands seizing me and tugging me down. The cold was lethal, and my limbs were rapidly becoming numb. I’d fallen into the water, I knew this perfectly well, yet I kept on mechanically lifting my feet up and