An Answer to Those Who Still Abuse Shostakovich

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An Answer to Those Who Still Abuse Shostakovich http://www.nytimes.com/library/books/082000shostakovich-mem

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August 20, 2000

Sovfoto

Dmitri Shostakovich in 1943 at a rural

summer retreat outside Moscow run by

the Union of Soviet Composers; at the

window is his daughter Galya.

An Answer to Those Who Still AbuseShostakovich

By IRINA SHOSTAKOVICH

OSCOW --Irina

Shostakovich is thewidow of Dmitri

Shostakovich. They married in

1962, and she was his third

wife. The following are her

reflections, translated by Irina

Roberts, on her husband's life

and posthumous reputation.

Dmitri Shostakovich was born

in 1906. He enjoyed early

success as a composer, but his

relations with the Soviet

regime deteriorated. In 1936,his opera "Lady Macbeth of the

Mtsensk District" was

condemned in Pravda as "muddle instead of music," and he was

denounced by friends and colleagues. His Fifth Symphony restored his

standing in 1937. In 1948 he was denounced again, with others, for

"formalist" tendencies and forced to recant. Though the climate of

repression relaxed somewhat after the death of Stalin in 1953,

recriminations persisted, and Shostakovich bore the marks of trauma to

the end of his life.

In 1973, he was named as a signatory to a letter denouncing the dissident

Russian physicist Andrei Sakharov. Earlier, he had been named as a

signatory to a statement demanding the release of the Greek composerMikis Theodorakis, who was imprisoned by Greece's right-wing regime

from 1967 to 1970.

Mrs. Shostakovich refers to Leo Arnshtam, a film director, and Isaak

Glikman, a drama critic and historian. Both were friends of

Shostakovich's throughout his lifetime. Lev Lebedinsky, a

musicologist, befriended Shostakovich in the 50's.


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The composer'swidow,addressingcritics, faultsSolomonVolkov's bookpublished asmemoirs.

The book to which she refers, "Testimony: The Memoirs of Dmitri

Shostakovich," as related to and edited by Solomon Volkov, was

published in 1979 by Harper & Row and has since been the subject of a

lively controversy over its authenticity.

mitri Shostakovich died 25 years ago this month. Since then, his

music has been alive and has gained in popularity; the number of

his fans has risen in leaps and bounds, and his music has found its way

into the hearts of people in many different countries. At present, youngperformers are taking the place of Shostakovich's deceased

contemporaries and lending their skills and talent to the art of performing

his music.

Shostakovich was loved and recognized in the music world ever since his

youth; that music world tried to protect and shelter him from the wrath

of his persecutors during the most difficult times, even when it was

dangerous and the forces were unequal. By defending him, people who

were themselves oppressed and scared were defending their own human

dignity and their right to create. Only very few of them had the courage

to protest openly, but most musicians persistently rebuffed all the

attacks, mockery and incitement mounted against him. Of course, there

were also rabid persecutors who were eager to please and expected to

benefit from such persecution, as well as born informers and those who

were simply easily persuaded and not very bright.

Dmitri Shostakovich was as defenseless as the rest of us, but he had

much more to lose. He had to worry about the future of his work, which

was treated shamelessly. Consequently, he considered it more important

than anything else to be worthy of his talent and to develop it, evading

his enemies and misleading them whenever possible. In the process, he

managed to help many other people, protecting and supporting them, and

for this he is remembered with gratitude.

But not by everyone. Even now there are

some people who nurse grievances and feel

offended that he did not help promote them,

even though it seemed to them he could

have.

Then there are those who believe they are as

talented as he was but think that he was far

too cunning and smart, and that they were

innocent and defenseless; that he prevented

them from making it to the top by the mere

fact of his existence.

There was yet another category: young people with progressive views,

who have aged by now, who tried to push Shostakovich forward and

force him to present their ideas in a way they themselves were too

cowardly to do. Furthermore, they were prepared to follow him, hide

behind him, while striving to achieve their most ambitious goals.

Everyone who knew the Soviet way of life has his or her own ideas

about it, but it needs a lot of courage to defend your ideas personally and

not use someone else as a shield.


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But now Dmitri Shostakovich is gone, and anything goes. The time has

come to exploit his name, even to the point of abusing and humiliating

his memory. Things are easier now, and people have found their voices.

The dead are defenseless.

They are now recalling what happened and what didn't and, by attributing

various scandalous remarks to the great composer, are finding it easy to

settle old scores, to appropriate his ideas and pass them off as their own.

Then, too, by collecting true and false testimonies from his aging

contemporaries and putting them through the grinder, people can create

any picture they wish and documentarily "prove" that Shostakovich had

no talent, that he was cunning and knew how to cheat, that he was weak

and dishonest. But it is also possible to prove the opposite.

The story of his life has been turned into a battlefield. Of course,

everything and everyone is pulled into the line of fire. They shout

obscenities on the Internet, publish articles and write books and plays

about Shostakovich; someone even went to the trouble of composing an

opera about him.

These people were and are still trying, but failing, to establish their rightto possess him. And it does not matter whether they shout from the

reactionary positions of party ideology or act under the avant-garde flag;

the right and the left meet in the end.

Among them are some of his talented pupils who were professionally

unsuccessful, envious colleagues, and music critics who are interested in

scandal above all else. Although they do not know or understand the

historical evidence involved, they are not ashamed to repeat any lies and

pass them off as established facts.

I take the liberty of claiming that people who have no morals, which are

vital in all human relations, will never understand Shostakovich and his

music. Ask yourself before you accuse someone else: how would youhave behaved at such a difficult time and in such difficult circumstances?

The only consolation is that no one can ever hurt or upset Dmitri

Shostakovich again, and time will eventually set everything right.

Volkov and 'Testimony'

During interviews, I am often asked about the veracity of the book

"Testimony" by Solomon Volkov, published as Shostakovich's

memoirs. Here is what I think.

Mr. Volkov worked for Sovetskaya Muzyka magazine, where

Shostakovich was a member of the editorial board. As a favor to BorisTishchenko, his pupil and colleague, Shostakovich agreed to be

interviewed by Mr. Volkov, whom he knew little about, for an article to

be published in Sovetskaya Muzyka. There were three interviews; each

lasted two to two and a half hours, no longer, since Shostakovich grew

tired of extensive chat and lost interest in the conversation. Two of the

interviews were held in the presence of Mr. Tishchenko. The interviews

were not taped.


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Mr. Volkov arrived at the second interview with a camera (Mr. Volkov's

wife, a professional photographer, always took pictures of Mr. Volkov

with anyone who might become useful in the future) and asked Mr.

Tishchenko and me to take pictures "as a keepsake." He brought a

photograph to the third interview and asked Shostakovich to sign it.

Shostakovich wrote his usual words: "To dear Solomon Maseyevich

Volkov, in fond remembrance. D. Shostakovich 13.XI.1974." Then, as

if sensing something amiss, he asked for the photograph back and,

according to Mr. Volkov himself, added: "In memory of our talks on

Glazunov, Zoshchenko and Meyerhold. D. Sh."

That was a list of the topics covered during the interviews. It shows that

the conversation was about musical and literary life in prewar Leningrad

(now St. Petersburg) and nothing more. Some time later, Mr. Volkov

brought Shostakovich a typed version of their conversations and asked

him to sign every page at the bottom. It was a thin sheaf of papers, and

Shostakovich, presuming he was going to see the proof sheets, did not

read them. I came into Shostakovich's study as he was standing at his

desk signing those pages without reading them. Mr. Volkov took the

pages and left.

I asked Shostakovich why he had been signing every page, as it seemed

unusual. He replied that Mr. Volkov had told him about some new

censorship rules according to which his material would not be accepted

by the publishers without a signature. I later learned that Mr. Volkov

had already applied for an exit visa to leave the country and was planning

to use that material as soon as he was abroad.

oon after that, Shostakovich died, and Mr. Volkov put his plans

into further action.

Mr. Volkov had told a lot of people about those pages, boasting his

journalist's luck. This threatened to complicate his exit. It seems that he

managed to contrive an audience with Enrico Berlinguer, secretary of the

Italian Communist Party, who happened to be visiting Moscow, showed

him the photograph signed by Shostakovich and complained that he, Mr.

Volkov, a friend of Shostakovich's, was not allowed to leave the country

for political reasons. In any case, an article about Mr. Volkov and the

same photograph appeared in the Italian Communist newspaper La

Stampa. Apparently, it did the trick.

I met Mr. Volkov at a concert and asked him to come and see me (but

without his wife, as he had wanted) and leave me a copy of the material

he had, which was unauthorized (since it had never been read by

Shostakovich). Mr. Volkov replied that the material had already been

sent abroad, and if Mr. Volkov was not allowed to leave, the material

would be published with additions. He soon left the country, and I never

saw him again.

Later on, I read in a booklet that came with the phonograph record of the

opera "Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District" conducted by Mstislav

Rostropovich, which was released abroad, that Mr. Volkov was

Shostakovich's assistant with whom he had written his memoirs.

Elsewhere I read that when Shostakovich was at home alone, he would

phone Mr. Volkov and they would see each other in secret.


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Only someone with rich fantasy could invent something like that; it was

not true, if only because at that time Shostakovich was very ill and was

never left on his own. And we lived outside Moscow at the dacha. There

was no opportunity for secret meetings. Mr. Volkov's name is nowhere

to be found in Shostakovich's correspondence of the time, in his letters

to Isaak Glikman, for example.

Mr. Volkov found a publisher in the United States, and the advertising

campaign began. Extracts from the book appeared in a German magazineand reached Russia, where at that time there was state monopoly on

intellectual property. VAAP, the Soviet copyright agency, asked for

verification of Shostakovich's signature. American experts confirmed its

authenticity. The book was published. Each chapter of the book was

preceded by words written in Shostakovich's hand: "Have read.

Shostakovich."

I can vouch that this was how Shostakovich signed articles by different

authors planned for publication. Such material was regularly delivered to

him from Sovetskaya Muzyka magazine for review, then the material

was returned to the editorial department, where Mr. Volkov was

employed. Unfortunately, the American experts, who did not speak

Russian, were unable and certainly had no need to correlate

Shostakovich's words with the contents of the text.

As for the additions, Mr. Volkov himself told me that he had spoken to

a lot of different people about Shostakovich, in particular to Lev

Lebedinsky, who later became an inaccurate memoirist and with whom

Shostakovich had ended all relations a long time before. A friend of

Shostakovich's, Leo Arnshtam, a cinema director, saw Mr. Volkov on

his request, and Arnshtam later regretted it. A story about a telephone

conversation with Stalin was written from his words. All this was

included in the book as though it were coming from Shostakovich

himself.

The book was translated into many languages and published in a number

of countries, except Russia. Mr. Volkov at first claimed that the

American publishers were against the Russian edition, then that the

royalties in Russia were not high enough, then that those offering to

publish it in Russia were crooks and, finally, that he had sold his

manuscript to a private archive and it was not available anymore.

Retranslation into Russian relieves the author of responsibility and

permits new liberties.

Other 'Signatures'

Dmitri Shostakovich was accused of signing a letter from the

intelligentsia against the academician Andrei Sakharov published in 1973

in Pravda. Yes, Shostakovich's name is among those signatories, but he

never signed the letter. On the morning of the day in question, I

answered a multitude of phone calls from Pravda, first saying that

Shostakovich was out, then saying he was at the dacha. When they said

they were going to send a car to the dacha, we simply went out and did

not come back until the evening when the issue of the paper was already

in print. Nevertheless, Shostakovich's name appeared among the

signatories.

Documents

An Answer to Those Who Still Abuse Shostakovich