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wordlesswhisper — It Was Fur Elise

Published: 2004-10-21 04:57:00 +0000 UTC; Views: 2197; Favourites: 12; Downloads: 226
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Description Yes, I remember those chords. The black and white of piano keys jumping up and down beneath dancing fingers. Yes, I remember them. The sleek and slender beauty of an old piano. And the echoes. I remember the echoes. They sounded through the house, and woke me in the mornings, as the sun crept up the bed. I would close my eyes and listen to the melody. There was never a sour note. It was Fur Elise.

Then, a change, into Moonlight Sonata, softer and slower, spinning almost. I could see the notes in my mind. They were great birds, swooping and calling softly to a place deep inside me. The birds nested in my soul.

I would get up slowly and tiptoe into the other room, to watch my mother playing the piano. Her hair fell gently past her shoulders, gentle waves of flame against her clothes. She would feel bad if she knew she’d woken me. She swayed slowly, her eyes shut. Her eyes were always closed. And she played her music on the piano. She smiled a little bit, a shy and secretive smile. These were her private moments in heaven, and mine although she never knew it.

The notes were pure, they were soft and thundering and tender and soothing and harsh. Sometimes they were harsh. At the very beginning, they were harsh, because she’d been crying. It’s hard to play the piano when you’re crying. But as she became enveloped in the music, her crying would stop. She found peace in the music, a deep and lasting peace that would carry her through the day.

The songs always lifted something inside of me. They were so wonderful. They were beautiful, and they made me want to make something beautiful.

I still hear the songs in my mind when I write, paint, or sketch. And the echoes. I can still hear the echoes. They make me want to make something beautiful. I can’t always do it, but I try. The birds are still nesting in my soul, but now they fly for me and my art. Now they fly when I create...and sometimes when I remember.
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Comments: 37

lunalopus [2006-06-08 04:34:58 +0000 UTC]

A very beautiful peace of two people's special time. Very lvoely and the repetion of symbols ties it all together. Great job!

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EbonDawn [2006-02-19 11:56:36 +0000 UTC]

Absolutely gorgeous style of repitition. I especially liked the section where he finds his mother playing and watches her. It shows the love of a child and the the awe and appreciation and understanding one only finds from children towards thier parents. A beautiful feeling of empathy.

The vague nature, in that no names are mentioned, is very effective as it brings a sort of subtlety to the piece, suggesting something much bigger and much more important than some of the things which we hold dearest. Just as one plays the piano, you feel the full spectrum, so much music to play, never all of it attainable.

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danielzklein [2005-08-20 10:59:22 +0000 UTC]

Hi!

A few words about why I didn't really like this, and then the actual point of my comment.

What you're doing here is a common mistake of beginning writers; I'm sure you've heard it a million times, but you're telling over showing. That can be good, if your telling is particularly characteristic or otherwise outstanding, but I find it isn't, here. Your prose is not particularly polished, you do not pay special attention to sonic features of the words or the rhythm of your sentences, and there are no great insights in the observations of your narrator.

You want us to believe that the notes "lifted something inside of [your narrator]" and that they were beautiful and all that. But simply saying so (aka telling) is one of the worst ways of making us believe this. I personally read this and thought "really? Why? How? I can't feel it". This kind of story works for people who feel exactly like you (and really, that is only you yourself), and mostly for others who haven't really read a lot of classical prose and don't really know how effectively a writer can convey feelings without saying "I felt happy".

But enough of that.

The reason I wrote this comment mostly (well, I stumbled across this because I heard you were unstaffed and it happened to be your featured dev at the time that I brought up your page; my heartfelt sympathies on that rough and entirely unfair treatment, by the way. I am appalled but not really surprised by it. I still love deviantART, but I've lost all trust in the management a long time ago, and I'm just staying here with a sort of cynical expectation of shit-will-happen-so-what) to say that one of my favourite writers on dA has a piece with an eerily similar name (I'm not suggesting any sort of copying in either direction! That'd be silly). =IfrozenspiritI has a piece called She is playing Für Elise . If you read that piece, for instance, you will hopefully be able to appreciate the difference between showing and telling. Rachel never once states explicitly that her main protagonist is really unhappy (at least not as far as I remember), but the sense of unfulfilled love and unhappiness permeate the piece, because of the images she chooses, because of the symbolical actions of the people around her, and finally because of the bitter-sweet "we do not really care" voice of her narrator.

If you're serious about writing prose, I'll be more than happy to continue offering my advice

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Exwhorecist [2005-07-27 04:38:36 +0000 UTC]

nice imagery and emotion... I can very well picture the scene you are describing and the reflection/pause it gives you ( I find piano very haunting - I play - or rather used to play and write tune-age )

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DamanMav [2005-07-13 04:59:37 +0000 UTC]

Beautiful

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joie-de-vivre [2005-05-04 20:26:23 +0000 UTC]

It's beautiful.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to joie-de-vivre [2005-05-07 21:02:36 +0000 UTC]

Thank you very much.

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peace-love-happiness [2004-12-17 02:05:31 +0000 UTC]

A beautiful piece of reality. Your mother is so...well, real is the word...as she is seen here. As are you. I love reality, made beautiful by art.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to peace-love-happiness [2004-12-17 07:47:59 +0000 UTC]

Thank you very much.

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moab-software [2004-12-15 04:48:56 +0000 UTC]

That's great. I've played piano when I'm sad, before.
I love fur elise, but it is not so soft and gentle as the Moonlight Sonata. Greats songs. I am in heaven, too, sometimes when I play.

:notsocheapsmile:

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wordlesswhisper In reply to moab-software [2004-12-15 04:50:56 +0000 UTC]

Thanks a ton. The piano can be extremely soothing. So can just about every musical instrument.

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Crowbeak [2004-12-15 00:36:49 +0000 UTC]

Wow, a tear-jerker. This describes so well how I feel about music.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to Crowbeak [2004-12-15 00:45:11 +0000 UTC]

Thank you very much for the comment and the fave.

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JackLeaf [2004-12-08 18:08:16 +0000 UTC]

Für Elise. Isn't it?

However, I like this... Can't say why, but it's beautiful, though frustrating at some points. It fails to keep the reader's attention in these above-mentioned points. It's just that they're too "soft" or passing.

"The songs always lifted something inside of me. They were so wonderful. They were beautiful, and they made me want to make something beautiful."

- Would be a good example. Also, it makes me thinking the word cliché inside my head.

I'm not good in giving critique...

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C-Novack [2004-11-23 03:29:00 +0000 UTC]

This is a beautifully written piece that draws the reader in not just by the story you relate but also by the method you chose to tell it in. It starts off directly as the author talking to us by addressing a question that leads to recollection of memories.

"Yes, I remember those chords. The black and white of piano keys jumping up and down beneath dancing fingers. Yes, I remember them."

By having the author/main character talk to us it makes it a personal experience one in which we are directly invited to share in this person's fondest memories of her mother and how it influenced her.

I like how you introduce imagery in the first couple of paragraphs and then later go back and use them to tie up the story into a nice little package that is a joy to read.

"I could see the notes in my mind. They were great birds, swooping and calling softly to a place deep inside me. The birds nested in my soul." Is introduced into the second paragraph which shows and demonstrates how it affected her/you

"I still hear the songs in my mind when I write or paint or sketch. And the echoes. I can still hear the echoes. They make me want to make something beautiful. I can’t always do it, but I try. The birds are still nesting in my soul, but now they fly for me and my art. Now they fly when I create...and sometimes when I remember." The last paragraph ties it all together here at the end. It shows and demonstrates how the memories continue to influence and shape her/your life. You have taken the statement in the second paragraph that mentions how the "birds" nested in your soul and continue with that imagery by having them take flight and "fly for me and my art"

Now a few critiques on the work:

"They were great birds, swooping and calling softly to a place deep inside me."
I think you can drop the comma because you have the reader pause and it stops the action and breaks the association of the birds with the "swooping and calling". Unless...you are using that pause to show the slow and soft motion of the music of Moonlight Sonata....things moving at a slower pace instead of a rapid and quick pace.

"Her hair fell gently past her shoulders, gentle waves of flame against her clothes."
Using the description of "waves of flame" is fairly common when describing red hair...and it conjures an instantious imagary of red hair and passion. But I think you could make this sentance stand out and reverbarate more; move it out of the common and into uncommon. You mention that her hair falls as "gentle waves of flame". The waves/tongues of flame fall gently upon her clothes....perhaps the action of how they fall on her clothes could further the description of "gentle flames" -the flames are gentle because they do not burn her clothes or to further the imagery"consume"/'envelope' her with a destructive passion/nature....kindle is a warm word that has the connotation of passon and comfort/nurture at the same time.

"She swayed slowly, her eyes shut. Her eyes were always shut."
I know you use the repetitive phraseing to further invoke memory and recall of that memory for us to visualize, but I think you could deviate from use of this literary tool just once in the case of these two sentances. We know and can already see her eyes are shut. It need not be repeated in the next line, rather I think you can say "Her eyes were always closed."


"I still hear the songs in my mind when I write or paint or sketch."
Too many "or's" make it wordy and bogg down the read. Very simply you could drop one "or" and replace it with a comma to make the line flow better:
"I still hear the songs in my mind when I write, paint or sketch."

Again this is a wonderful piece and I enjoyed reading it.

Good luck in the contest

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wordlesswhisper In reply to C-Novack [2004-11-23 06:03:57 +0000 UTC]

Thank you very very much for the extremely in-depth comment. You don't know how much I appreciate that. I will certainly take your critiques into consideration, and see what I can do to fix the piece. Thank you once again.

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asaila [2004-11-04 17:07:51 +0000 UTC]

Beethoven! ^_^ Fur Elise and Moonlight Sonata have got to be two of my favourite classical piano pieces. And I completely relate to how your mother felt when playing piano. Playing just made the world go away for a little bit and you felt better afterwards.

Too bad I had to stop. ;_; But I sing to make up for it.

pardon me, whilst I this piece. It's simply beautiful in all of it's simplicity. Very touching indeed.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to asaila [2004-11-05 04:20:42 +0000 UTC]

Wow! Thank you so much! I really wasn't expecting this strong of a reaction to this piece.

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asaila In reply to wordlesswhisper [2004-11-07 00:38:43 +0000 UTC]

musicians are emotional. I just happen to get really emotional.

Plus, I'm really prone to moments of sappiness.

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damphyr [2004-11-03 06:35:53 +0000 UTC]

THis is so very beautiful. It really does paint a picture in your mind. Joy and sorrow all in one little grouping of words. Beautiful writing, nice work indeed.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to damphyr [2004-11-03 15:26:10 +0000 UTC]

Wow, thanks so very much. You make me happy.

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atwaalseyes [2004-11-01 03:17:36 +0000 UTC]

Gorgeous. My mom used to play Chopin to put me to sleep. It's amazing what a piano can do...

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wordlesswhisper In reply to atwaalseyes [2004-11-01 05:00:12 +0000 UTC]

Thankyou. I've always loved the sound of a piano. There's something almost therapeutic about it.

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kittykat69 [2004-10-27 18:37:35 +0000 UTC]

very nice

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wordlesswhisper In reply to kittykat69 [2004-10-29 07:34:59 +0000 UTC]

Thanks much.

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kittykat69 In reply to wordlesswhisper [2004-11-01 22:06:35 +0000 UTC]

np

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kinderlovegrrl [2004-10-24 13:37:36 +0000 UTC]

Beautifully written piece, you've completely captured the magic that we see in our mothers when we are younger. I can just imagine her playing and how it must have made you feel.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to kinderlovegrrl [2004-10-24 19:09:05 +0000 UTC]

That's what I was aiming for, and I'm glad that I acheived it. Thank you very much.

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shortidiva19 [2004-10-24 04:41:14 +0000 UTC]

Very touching. I never realized piano playing could be so symbolic, even after reading the Joy Luck Club. The poem makes it seem as if your mother is,within her mind, dancing when she is playing. Very enchanting. Well done.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to shortidiva19 [2004-10-24 04:43:44 +0000 UTC]

Wow. Thankyou so, so much. I really appreciate it.

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sargeras [2004-10-23 07:21:31 +0000 UTC]

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wordlesswhisper In reply to sargeras [2004-10-23 07:23:42 +0000 UTC]

Thanks.

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sargeras In reply to wordlesswhisper [2004-10-23 07:43:24 +0000 UTC]

no probs

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akanah [2004-10-21 17:44:37 +0000 UTC]

I'm glad you submitted this, it's lovely

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wordlesswhisper In reply to akanah [2004-10-21 19:51:58 +0000 UTC]

Thanks.

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Misaniovent [2004-10-21 13:52:10 +0000 UTC]

As I said before, the repetition here is very nice. I like the emotions, and the images. Good job.

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wordlesswhisper In reply to Misaniovent [2004-10-21 14:27:56 +0000 UTC]

Thankyou again.

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