"Modern Immortal"

"I envy you your going to Zakopane. You are going to meet one of the most extraordinary young men you ever met." Two fast-traveling carriages had drawn up side by side in a Polish mountain village and the lovely Helena Gorska Baroness de Rosen, bound for Paris, was calling out to her friend, Actress Helena Modjeska on her way home from a U. S. tour.

That was 50 years ago. When she arrived in Zakopane, Modjeska met Ignace Jan Paderewski, a slender, golden-haired youth who had begun to doubt whether he could ever achieve a concert career. Modjeska helped him with money, made him give a concert in Cracow at which she recited. Some years later Baroness Helena became Paderewski's wife. Fortnight ago she died in Switzerland (TIME, Jan. 29). Last week appeared the first important biography to tell how Paderewski, encouraged by both the Helenas, became the great pianist and patriot he is today.*

Polish patriotism more than musical genius was the heritage of Ignace Jan Paderewski. The Poland he grew up in was partitioned among Russia, Germany, Austria. Russia ruled his native province, Podolia. In the Rising of 1863, Paderewski's father was arrested and imprisoned for more than a year. His mother was born in Siberia, of parents exiled because Tsar Nicholas I was determined to make an example of the Poles.

Paderewski was no piano prodigy. His hands were small, his fingers stubby. When he started taking lessons he could hardly span an octave, preferred to romp with his sister Antonina who at 75 still keeps house for him in Switzerland. As a 12-year-old he went to the Conservatory in Warsaw and there a dozen moppets matched him in all save patience and determination.

Scales, arpeggios, double octaves--the young Paderewski often practiced 17 hours a day. When he finished his course at the Conservatory he received an instructorship which he supplemented with private pupils, for 23-c- an hour. He fell in love, married, but his young wife died in childbirth, left him a weakling son and her dowry to spend on his own education.

Most of the world's great pianists have been well launched on their careers at 20. At that age Paderewski started his real study, learned what discouragement was. At 24 he met Modjeska, gave the Cracow concert and went to Vienna to learn from the great Leschetitsky who hesitated to accept him for a pupil because he was "rather beyond the age." At 26 Paderewski made his Viennese debut, to be followed by the conquest of Paris and Baroness Helena who made it her business to care for the invalid son Alfred until his death in 1899.

In the U. S. alone Paderewski has played in over 200 cities, for over 5,000,000 persons, traveled some 360,000 miles in his private car. When the War broke out the U. S. seemed to him the logical place to start a fight for Poland. He gave up the piano for speechmaking, interested Colonel Edward Mandell House who in turn interested Woodrow Wilson.

Paderewski's diplomacy at Versailles and his struggle to harmonize Poland are matters of history. When for unity's sake he relinquished the premiership, left fighting Josef Pilsudski in command, the world had no idea that it would soon be hearing Paderewski the pianist again. But Paderewski's energy has always been phenomenal and his fortune had been all but lost on Poland.

Author Charles Phillips, a Notre Dame English literature professor, died in December. His friendship with Paderewski began in Poland where he served with the Red Cross after the War. Author Phillips' book is complete but in no wise pedantic. It suffers chiefly by its effusiveness. For Phillips, Paderewski is a great composer. His dying wife and acute neuritis which has plagued him for years kept Paderewski in Switzerland this winter, minding his dogs and chickens. Next year when he will be 74 he has promised his manager another U. S. tour.

* Paderewski, The Story of a Modern Immortal--Charles Phillips--Macmillan ($4).

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