The Noise of Time by Julian Barnes

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


"In Galileo's day, a fellow scientist
Was no more stupid than Galileo.
He was well aware that the Earth revolved,
But he also had a large family to feed."
(From Y. Yevtushenko's poem, translated by G. Reavey and quoted by Julian Barnes)

Another outstanding book from Julian Barnes. The Noise of Time (2016), a set of vignettes and impressions rather than a novel, would probably be best categorized as a fictionalized biography of the famous Russian composer, Dmitri Shostakovich. The emphasis is on the word 'fictionalized' as the readers who reach for this book to learn the "actual facts" from the life of the composer may be disappointed. First of all, one of the author's main points is that it is not really possible to know the exact truth about the past. So-called "facts" are in fact memories or "versions" of events and the past exists only as a set of interpretations. Secondly, recounting events from the composer's life is not the author's goal. Mr. Barnes assembles Shostakovich's persona by constructing beliefs, motives, attributes, and even behaviors that fit his artistic vision.

What the reader does get from the book is a realistic portrayal of the hard-to-imagine horrors of Soviet life and death under Stalin. I was lucky to be born in the waning years of Stalin's life: the Soviet-installed regime in Poland killed and tortured "only" a tiny fraction of the millions of ideology victims who perished in the Soviet-dominated part of Europe; the horrors did not touch me directly. But I know enough about these times from my family and friends to recognize how sharp and accurate Mr. Barnes' depiction of the horrors of human depravity, enslavement, humiliation and pain is.

In those dark times of humanity any citizen could expect to be arrested without any reason at any time, locked in a cell, tortured for days and days, until that citizen decided to confess to non-existing crimes, possibly denounce many other innocent people, and only then be shot. Quick execution was for lucky people. The worst was having to collaborate with the murderers if one wanted to save their family. The worst was having to denounce your friends and betray your ideals in order to save your wife and children.

One of the two most moving passages in the book is about Shostakovich's nightly ritual of preparing for the arrest and trying the spare his family from humiliation:

"Each night he followed the same routine: he evacuated his bowels, kissed his sleeping daughter, kissed his wakeful wife, took the small case from her hands. [...] And then he stood and waited."

Another touching fragment recounts the composer's dramatic visit, with a "peacemaking" mission to New York where - in the "greatest humiliation of his life" - he denounced Igor Stravinsky, his musical idol, a composer whom he greatly admired. Mr. Barnes skillfully shows Shostakovich's two faces: one of a public supporter of the Communist party and - at the same time - the other, of an "enemy of the people" waiting for arrest and wondering why he has been spared.

American readers often do not have any notion of how a system governed by ideology (any ideology!) works and how anyone can be forced to commit the vilest acts to spare their family. I strongly recommend this book. For a wider and deeper panorama of the Soviet-era horrors I recommend Anne Applebaum's Gulag or The Crushing of Eastern Europe .

Four stars.




View all my reviews