Prairie Sonata

Part I of Prairie Sonata begins in 1948, three years after the end of World War II. Mira Adler , 11-years-old, is living with her parents and little brother, Sammy, in Ambrosia, a medium-sized town located in the heart of southern Manitoba’s sunflower country. Eastern European Jewish immigrants, drawn by freedom from persecution, poverty, and pogroms, settled in the area. In time, the community established I. L. Peretz School, a Jewish day school offering English language content in one half of the day and Jewish studies in the other. A secular school, Mira states that it “coincided perfectly with [her] father’s philosophy on religion. He never davened, or prayed, in shul, and hadn’t even had a bar mitzvah.” (p. 9) Nevertheless, the family kept a kosher table, and Yiddish, the lingua franca of central and eastern European Jews, was spoken in the household as much as English. Reuven Adler is a general practice physician, his wife, Claire, is “a balabusta, a perfect homemaker”, (p. 14) and the family lives in a two-storey home on a “gracious, wide, tree-lined boulevard.” (p. 4) Life in the Adler home is comfortable and stable.

The aftermath of World War II brings a recent arrival from post-war Europe into their lives, a new Yiddish teacher at Peretz, Ari Bergman, dubbed “Chaver B” by the students. Generous and welcoming, Mira’s mother invites him to attend their Friday night Shabbos (Sabbath) dinner. Chaver B, noticing a violin case on the shelf of the bookcase in the family’s living room, asks who plays it. Four years ago, Mira had begun violin lessons, but, with the departure of her teacher, she hadn’t played much since. After dinner, at her father’s request, Mira plays, Chaver B applauds her performance, tells her that she shows promise, reveals that he used to be a violinist, and offers to be her teacher.

He no longer plays the violin, claiming that his left arm is injured, but he capably describes violin technique and encourages Mira to visualize the sounds that she will produce. Music lessons are far more interesting than they were previously, and she makes friends, both with her violin and with Chaver B. He is a real gentleman, with the formal manners of pre-war Europe. At the school, he is respected as a good teacher, strict, but kind and patient. Mira senses something about Chaver B that is very different, “something heartwarming and heartbreaking about him”. (p. 37) Chaver B appears reticent to talk about his life before coming to Canada; however, at one of their weekly dinners, Mira asks whether or not he had brothers or sisters, and, although he answers without reserve, it’s clear from her parents’ reaction that she has wandered into uncomfortable territory.

The first part of a sonata introduces its themes and tensions, and tension intensifies between what is known and unknown. Mira begins to wonder about the secrets of other people. She recollects being told family secrets, like the reasons for the spinster status of her two aunts, Lillie and Bella. A visit to her dad’s medical office for a splinter removal leads to her learning that Chaver B is one of Dr. Adler’s patients. Why? Stories about secrets enthrall her, and, increasingly, she wonders about the secret that seems to be the essence of Chaver B.

In the meantime, the school year continues, the regular classroom routine counterpointed by various Jewish holidays. Soon, the school year is over, and the glorious luxury of summer break has begun. The family drives out on day trips to Winnipeg Beach and the nearby town of Gimli. Idyllic though these summer places were, “not all the communities were open to Jews. Some of the beach towns had laws restricting Jewish people from owning property there.” (p. 62) It’s Mira’s first experience of anti-Semitism. Later, a series of fires set by a teenage arsonist at Jewish-owned businesses, both in Ambrosia and a nearby town, offers more evidence of such prejudice. Nevertheless, Mira’s life is essentially a good one.

One day, riding her bike home from her volunteer job at the local hospital, Mira sees Chaver B standing “like a sunflower when it reaches maturity, his head bent forward, as though the weight he was bearing was too great and if he leaned over any farther, he would break.” (p. 85) Stopping to greet him, she finds him completely unresponsive. Racing home, she catches up with her father, tells him of Chaver B’s catatonic state, and together, they return. Dr. Adler takes Chaver B to the hospital, and later, back home, when Mira asks what happened, her mother speaks of the unbearable trauma experienced by those who survived the Nazis’ concentration camps. Although Chaver B recovers sufficiently to return to the school, it’s clear that something had changed, and one evening, when the RCMP arrive at the Adler home, he becomes agitated. The police are there to question Dr. Adler about the political leanings of one of his former medical school colleagues, suggesting his friend is a communist. Learning of the socialist origins of Peretz School is a surprise for Mira, and she begins to wonder if Chaver B is a secret communist.
In Part II of the novel, as in the second section of a sonata, Mira is conflicted about ideas she once believed to be true. One afternoon, Mira visits Chaver B at his apartment, taking him a “care package” of food her mother has prepared. Ill with a very bad cold, Chaver B has been away from work for some days. As Mira boils water for tea, she sees three photos on Chaver B’s desk. Mira realizes that the photos are of the family that Chaver B claimed he didn’t have, and when she asks about them, he replies, “I will tell you what happened.” (p. 108)

Mira learns of Ari Bergman’s early years in Prague, a cultural capital and home to one of Europe’s largest Jewish communities. Ari Bergman’s family was middle-class and well-educated, and, although he, like Mira, attended Jewish day school, celebrated religious holidays, and attended synagogue services on the High Holidays, he states that his family was not religious. Music enriched the fabric of Jewish life in Prague, and beginning with lessons at the age of four, Chaver B progressed rapidly, showing great talent, expecting to be a concert violinist. But by 1939, the Nazis had marched into Prague, and over time, the persecution of the Jewish community began and accelerated with shocking swiftness.
Mira’s violin lessons continue, but so do the history lessons in which Chaver B imparts more and more of his story. He has suffered many losses: his beautiful young wife, Dvorah and the child they were expecting; his parents and younger brother, Yossi; and everything that made life meaningful. Shipped to Auschwitz, he was assigned to work in the mines, marching to work each day to the sound of martial music played by an orchestra composed of camp inmates. He asks if he can join them and is finally released from manual labour. Chaver B stays alive but at the price of the lives of others. As the war continues and the Germans lose ground to the Russians and the Americans, the orchestra is disbanded, and its members are sent, first to Dachau and then, to another work camp. Amazingly, Chaver B survives a bout of typhus and execution by his captors, finally to be liberated by the American forces.

Mira knew about the concentration camps, but Chaver B’s detailed account opens her eyes to the enormity of its evil. She learns of injustices closer to home when her father tells her that, excellent student though he was, he applied to medical school three times before acceptance. At that time, a quota system limited the number of Jewish students admitted to professional faculties. Her faith is also challenged when Chaver B’s reflects on his prayers of mourning: “It was like praying to the wind. No one listened and no one heard.” (p. 163) When he finally does play the violin for her, Mira realizes the depths of his losses, and that, for him, the world was “devoid of hope, devoid of family, devoid of home, devoid of everything.” (p. 178)

Part III of Prairie Sonata moves rapidly towards the story’s conclusion. Mira is now in Grade 8 at public school, and her awareness of the difference between it and the “warm, cozy, comfortable cocoon” (p. 197) of Peretz School is discomfiting. Placed in an advanced academic program – Major Work – the endless homework, special projects, non-stop testing, and classroom competitiveness turns learning – a former delight - into drudgery. She’s invited to a school dance by a boy who isn’t Jewish, and later, when their romance ends because of his parents’ objections, Mira is disappointed at his lack of courage and conviction in his own beliefs and feelings. There’s a disconnect between what she is taught in Canadian history class and her parents’ recollections of the government’s refusal to accept Jewish immigrants escaping from war-time Europe. She asks herself, “What was the truth? What I believed to be true and what seemed to be true were not coinciding.” (p. 244)

By the penultimate chapter of Part III, Mira is in a state of emotional turmoil. One evening in mid-November, due to illness, Mira’s friend Annie cancels their plans to go to the movies. At her mother’s suggestion, Chaver B takes Annie’s place, and they attend Singing in the Rain. At the show, he is immersed in the joy of the movie, and, on the walk back home, she is aware of a different feeling existing between the two. “Had something just happened between Chaver B and me? It was almost as if a spell had been cast.” (p. 248) A tentative relationship between Chaver B and another woman has ended, and now Mira thinks of him constantly. That week, on his return to their weekly violin lessons, he seems to be a different man. He has some new music for Mira, and he plays it for her on her violin. It is a transformative experience for both. But, this is a sonata with no resolution, only a tragic ending: Chaver B commits suicide. In the book’s Coda, Mira, now an adult with children of her own, reflects on her relationship with Chaver B, and her sorrow at his loss. Digging through a box of items from the past, she finds a book of violin music, and, in it, a letter from him, understanding that, through his death, he had come to a resolution of his pain.

Prairie Sonata is a truly extraordinary book on so many levels. Over the story’s five-year span in this coming-of-age story, Mira changes from an 11 year-old living in a close-knit community to a 16-year-old confronting the world’s unjust and sometimes cruel realities. It is lyrical but not falsely sentimental, a story recounted in the voice of a reflective and incisive adult. Prairie Sonata takes the reader on a journey back in time: there’s no television set in the Adler household; stay-at-home moms baked pies from scratch (using a wooden spoon) and volunteered time, energy, culinary and social skills for teas, school, and community events; and kids could attend the movies (double-features) for the princely sum of twenty cents (paid by coin, in cash). But, then, as now, elementary school students assumed that their teachers were much older than they actually are, and high school students in advanced academic programs are still shark-like in their ruthless competitiveness. And anyone who has endured the extremes of Manitoba’s climate knows that “freezing winters and piercing winds, . . . short winter days and long winter nights,” (p. 1) as well as “a lot of pesky mosquitoes in summertime” (p. 2) describes it concisely.

For those unfamiliar with Judaism, Shefrin Rabin has seamlessly integrated details of its practices, traditions, and tenets, as lived in Mira’s community. English translations in the context of dialogue clarify the meaning of Yiddish words and phrases, providing a sense of that language’s rhythm and reinforcing its importance to the culture. Characters are authentic: good people, usually well-intentioned, but with quirks and flaws, and yes, secrets. In the 21st century, the concepts of post-traumatic stress, survivor guilt, and the emotional impact of trauma are much better understood and are more discussed than they would have been in the 1950’s. Of course, so much more is now known about the Holocaust and the horrors which Chaver B recounted to Mira.

Following the text of the story, the “Author’s Note”, and “Acknowledgments”, there’s a “Discussion and Study Guide.” I am uncertain as to whether this is intended for classroom study of the novel or for a group of general readers, such a book club. As a former classroom teacher of high school English, I am hoping that the intention is the latter, rather than the former. The enjoyment of far too many novels can be ruined by classroom study and discussion.

With its female protagonist, Prairie Sonata will appeal to female readers of age 14 and up, although it’s accessible reading for a capable 12-year-old. It’s a worthy addition to any high school library’s fiction collection, and, for adults who grew up in Winnipeg during the 1950’s, there are special resonances they will discover as they read.