Rating: 
Summary: Great story of the really great musician
Review: I found this book unforgettable. The author writes in a very detached style, and the effect that this has, can only be described as "haunting." We have to keep reminding ourself that the events in this book really happened,and that those were real people who were killed.
I saw Polanski's "THE PIANIST" last weekend,was very impressed and wanted to learn more about the real hero of the movie. I searched online for his recordings. After two days I received two CD's from Amazon related to Wladyslaw Szpilman: One with his beautiful songs sung by Wendy Lands (wonderfully arranged, smooth, some jazzy, some kind of pop, very american-like music, which I love to hear in the mornings) and another one with the original recordings of his great classical interpretations - Chopin ( i.e. the Nocturne from the final scene of the movie ), Rachmaninoff, Bach and his own music - Concertino for Piano and Orchestra composed in the Warsaw Ghetto in a time of deepest repressions by the Germans (I was surprised how optimistic this music sounds). He was a great pianist and composer. After I learned his story through the book, the movie, now I also got in touch with this man personally, through his music and artistry. Great feeling!!
Rating:
Summary: A Heartwrenching and Powerful Story
Review: The story of Wladyslaw Szpilman has echoed in my mind and heart for so many days since it has been read. Although it deals in a very real and non-sugarcoated way with an important period of life for Jews in Warsaw, it is really his own extraordinary story of one man'survival after loosing all that is dear to him,and being able to endure unknown human suffering. as a result. To think that this man, after all his ordeals of loss and pain, could still survive and be able to love, hope and have faith is truly remarkable. This story should be read by all not only as a reminder of what we should never forget, but also as a testament of what we should always remember about the durability of the human spirit and the will to survive. Truly, truly an unforgetable masterpiece...
Rating: 
Summary: Unbiased Portrayal
Review: Szpilman's portrayal of the events and people of WWII in Poland seemed unbiased. He describes people and their actions as they were with no favoritism based on race or religion. If for nothing else the book should be recognized for this. The historical content offered me an opportunity to broaden my knowledge of WWII in Poland and beyond. It is sad that this book is not more highly publicized I genuinely hope ulterior motives are not to blame. I plan on seeing the movie next. If you are looking for a book that offers an impartial view of live in Warsaw during WWII this is it. This book in many ways opened my eyes to what really transpired during those year and how cruel people can be to one another. The book may have been better off without Biermann's piece. Hence the missing fifth star.
Rating:
Summary: A Survivor And A Son
Review: There are a large number of stories that detail the survival of individuals and of the human spirit during World War II. Stories that specifically are told by those who were the primary targets of Hitler's evil are often the most fantastic, as these people were not just surviving a war, they were surviving a war while they were simultaneously hunted. The book does contain descriptions of brutality, however they serve as exclamation marks to the ordeal of surviving inside the nation that lost more to the death squads of The Nazi's than any other country. As was the case with other countries that were on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain when it fell, Wladyslaw Szpilman went from a Poland occupied by The Nazi's to a Poland occupied by The USSR.A man who was young, and whose experiences were extremely fresh wrote this account in 1945. After the book appeared it was suppressed, and it was to be 50 years before it would be available for the public. One of the striking features of the narrative is that it is not an emotional account that vents all the dark hatreds he reasonably could have aired, the book is not a pleasant treatise on life during The Holocaust, it seemingly is related as it took place, without need for anything other than his personal observations. As a musician and well-known composer in Europe, perhaps his writing style is similar to the discipline and management of creating a musical piece for piano. I don't know the answer, however it is very noticeable in the book. When a person survives a near miss with death, people often say it was just not his or her time to go. If this expression applies to anyone it applies to Mr. Szpilman. Any survivor of this time was a part of a small group, however this man had something looking out for him. The train that takes away his family offers him what would appear to be a brief respite. He hides and is hidden by various people for years until one day the building he has hidden in is burning, and in a moment of despondence he takes medication that puts him to sleep, and then lies down to die. His alternative would have been to walk out the door in to the hands of The SS. He sleeps; he wakes, and survives the fire. Still the SS come and he hangs from a portion of the roof until they leave. It could easily be labeled luck that he managed to dodge so many near misses that would have lead to an instant, or a prolonged death in the camps. That good fortune, such as it was, helped, he survived as he took his year ordeal a day at a time. We are able to share this experience as his son Andrzej Szpilman never gave up his efforts to have the book published. It took half of the 20th Century to get the book back into print, and into hands of readers. The perseverance of the son is a tribute to the monumental accomplishment of his father's survival.
Rating:
Summary: A survival story
Review: This book gave you a different view of survival of the Jewish people in Poland during Hitler's reign. Instead of a survival in a camp, Szpilman survives in Warsaw (first in the ghetto and then outside the ghetto). The story keeps you reading and makes for an enjoyable and unbelievable tale of survival. At times, the book seems surreal. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading about WWII or the plight of the Jewish peole in WWII. Enjoy!!
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Summary: A factual memoir of beating the odds
Review: I read The Pianist in the original Polish, but the book will read well in any language. As Szpilman's son writes in the preface to the book, his father was not a writer, and the memoir is a testament to that fact. There is no overly flowerly language, no planned-out metaphors. The Pianist is simply a factual account of the mirculous events which lead to Wladyslaw Szpilman surviving first the Warsaw ghetto and later hiding out in Warsaw for years until the war ended. I learned quite a bit about life in the ghetto by reading the book, and found it interesting that Szpilman did not write with rage or hatred towards those who made his life a living hell for so many years. The memoir is, in a way, an exercise in fate -- there were so many opportunities when Szpilman could have died, could have been discovered, could have been sent to Treblinka, that it seems that his survival was written in the stars. The Pianist is a short memoir, a quick read, and very much recommended to anyone who is interested in the Holocaust or World War II. Roman Polanski was just in Poland shooting the movie version, and I'm interested to see how that turns out.
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Summary: Unforgettable
Review: I've never read a Holocaust memoir before. Or anything dealing with WWII except what I was taught in High School. I happened to pick up this book while looking for another, thinking of a pianist friend of mine. I found this book unforgettable. What really struck me was not the dull, unthinking cruelness executed by the SS, but rather the general attitude of the persecuted in such bizarre surroundings. The pretending to have a perfectly normal life while neighbors and friends are senselessly killed. The simultaneous depression and optimism; the inability to cope with what's happening and the hope that it will all end soon. Almost to the point of which it could be said that the SS was merciful to the ones they killed, since for the living it was constant mental torture. As others have noted, the author writes in a very detached style, as though he were an observer of his own life. The effect that this has can only be described as "haunting." Partially because of this, I had to keep reminding myself that the events in this book really happened, that those were real people who were killed. I am only 23 years old -- no memories of wars earlier than the Gulf. In school we were taught about the Holocaust, of course: so many millions of Jews were killed, they had gas chambers, and that's about it. This book made it real. When I have children, this book will be required reading before graduating.
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Summary: Why This Book is Special
Review: This book conveys a sense of what day to day life in occupied Warsaw was like. I was fascinated to read about how many Jews in the ghetto tried to hold onto normalcy in the face of Nazi horrors. I am not well read in Holocaust literature (I've only read Anne Frank, and Jane Marks' The Hidden Children), but this book opened up my eyes and touched me in astonishing ways. The narrative about the German who helped Szpilman was heartbreaking, and added a deeply provocative dimension to this otherwise wonderful book. I plan to tell everyone I know about this book!
Rating: 
Summary: I wanted to like this book more then I did
Review: I realy wanted to like this book, and for the first half of this book I loved it. The first half of "The Pianist" is an excellent insight into a rarley told and very sad chapter in modern History, that of life inside the Nazi occupied Wasaw gettho. Indeed this part of the book is a delight to read it is as educational as it is chilling. The discription of the brutality of the Nazi SS will move all but the hardest of hearts. The problem I had with this book is the second half, starting with his escape by simply walking away from a work detail, seemed so improbable that I had a tough time beliving that this book was purely a work of nonfiction. Some of it could be true after all many Jews beat the odds in Europe during WWII, but Mr Szpilman's story just seems to me to have been overly embelished.
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Summary: An important lesson in the evil and goodness of humanity
Review: This book offers an invaluable example of how, even in the worst circumstances, good and the will to survive can triumph over evil. Although the cruelties of the Holocaust are detailed, the author never forgot the kindness of others and with equal emphasis meticulously recorded each good deed which gave him the strength to carry on. The acts of kindness shown to the author during the final days of Warsaw's occupation make the ending historically significant, demonstrating that the desire to destroy was not universal among Germans, and that many German solders were merely pawns in Hitler's sadistic game of domination.
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