Dec 22, 2009

Wunderkind | Introduction

Written in 1936, when Carson McCullers was 19 years old, ‘‘Wunderkind’’ was McCullers’s first published work. It presents the story of Frances, a teenage girl who has been considered a musical prodigy but who, after years of training and sacrifice, seems suddenly incapable of fulfilling the bright expectations she has always held. In the brief space of a single piano lesson, we see her struggling to recover the confidence and artistry she once knew and trying to navigate a flood of conflicting emotions and desires that threaten to overwhelm her. Often praised as a sensitive, insightful portrayal of the pressures and isolation of adolescence, it is marked by a dramatic tension that increases relentlessly throughout the story—despite the fact that very little ‘‘action’’ occurs. That action takes place in the studio of her music teacher, but the story’s actual setting is the intimate depths of Frances’s troubled mind.

While teenagers and their problems are a common focus in fiction, relatively few ‘‘coming-of-age’’ stories were written while their authors were still teenagers themselves. Critical analysis of ‘‘Wunderkind’’ usually stresses its many autobiographical elements: McCullers had trained as a classical pianist for most of her own childhood and suddenly gave up her ambitions for a musical career after an emotional break in her relationship with a beloved piano teacher. Yet there are also intriguing differences between Frances’s experience and that of her author, and while its details are specific to a world of passionate artistry and intense pressures that few of us ever know, McCullers’s vivid writing seems to evoke universal human feelings and dilemmas. As a result, readers of all ages, and vastly different experience, have been able to recognize themselves in this troubled young musician.

Wunderkind Summary

Frances’s Arrival
‘‘Wunderkind’’ takes place on a winter afternoon in Cincinnati, Ohio, presumably in the 1930s (‘‘the present,’’ when the story was written). Fifteen- year-old Frances arrives at the home of her music teacher, Mr. Bilderbach, for her piano lesson. She is a bit early, and as she sits down to wait we see that she is restless and agitated; her fingers are twitching uncontrollably, and we are told that the sight of them intensifies ‘‘the fear that had begun to torment her for the past few months.’’

This fear seems to be centered on her music, which she has not performed as well lately as once she had. She silently encourages herself to have ‘‘a good lesson—like it used to be.’’ As Bilderbach emerges from his studio to greet Frances, her thoughts drift briefly into the past (as they will often throughout the story), and we learn that she has been studying with him for many years—most of her life, as it feels to her now. Their brief meeting only increases her tension, and we see that Bilderbach is also uncomfortable and distracted. The words they exchange seem light and pleasant (he explains that he is ‘‘running over a little sonatina’’ in the studio with a colleague, offers Frances milk and cake, and expresses confidence that she will have ‘‘a very fine lesson’’ today)—but both seem to be affecting a forced cheerfulness they do not feel. Frances tries to smile, but is arrested by the sudden vision of ‘‘her fingers sinking powerless into a blur of piano keys’’; when Bilderbach makes his comment about the ‘‘fine lesson’’ he expects, his smile seems to ‘‘crumble at the corners.’’ Mr. Lafkowitz, the violinist who has been playing with Bilderbach, also comes out and greets Frances familiarly, asking how her work is coming along. Again she seems to be overwhelmed by anxiety, and by a sense of being ‘‘clumsy and overgrown,’’ which Lafkowitz seems to bring out in her. She hesitates, and looks uncertainly toward Bilderbach before giving her reply. He says nothing, and we are told only that he ‘‘turned away’’—but later, Frances is haunted by ‘‘the memory of Mister Bilderbach’s face as he stared at her a moment ago.’’ It is clearly not a look of reassurance, and she bluntly tells Lafkowitz, ‘‘I’m doing terribly.’’ Lafkowitz begins to encourage her, but Bilderbach, already back in the studio, interrupts with ‘‘a harsh chord’’ from the piano, calling him back to the duet they had been playing. As Lafkowitz returns to the music, he calls Frances’s attention to ‘‘the picture of Heime’’ in a magazine on the table—Heime Israelsky being Lafkowitz’s star violin student.

Waiting for the Lesson
While Frances waits, McCullers takes the reader inside the girl’s troubled mind in a hectic series of flashbacks, dreams, and meditations that crowd her thinking, all set to the background music of Lafkowitz and Bilderbach’s duet. Opening the magazine Lafkowitz had indicated, Frances sees a portrait of Heime Israelsky, who is being hailed as a ‘‘talented young violinist,’’ and appears to be on the verge of an illustrious concert career. Suddenly she shifts to the unpleasant memory of that morning’s breakfast. Frances prefers to skip breakfast and munch candy bars at school, but today her father had served her a fried egg; when the yolk broke and ‘‘the slimy yellow oozed over the white,’’ Frances had burst into tears. Whatever the source of this intense emotional reaction, it is the same feeling she has now, as she places the magazine with Heime’s photo back on the table.

Closing her eyes and listening to the men’s music, Frances feels exhausted, and drifts into the ‘‘weary half-dreams’’ she has been having ‘‘just before she dropped off to sleep on the nights when she had over-practiced.’’ Her nightmarish visions are composed of the looming faces of Bilderbach, Mrs. Bilderbach, Lafkowitz, and Heime; of ‘‘phrases of music seesawing crazily’’; and the repeated German word Wunderkind (‘‘miracle child,’’ an artistic prodigy.) These elements swirl around her in grotesque distortion, building to a terrifying crescendo. On some nights, we learn, when she is not so tired, the dreams are simpler and far more pleasant; at such times ‘‘the music soar[s] clearly in her head,’’ and she experiences ‘‘quick, precise little memories’’—not the emotional confusion of her nightmares, or the jumbled memories that tumble through her mind now. After a brief reference to a concert she and Heime have recently given, and the repetition of the word Wunderkind, Frances’s thoughts turn to Mr. Bilderbach. Her thinking is still restless and disjointed, but begins to follow two distinct paths: a review of the time she has spent as Bilderbach’s student, and an effort to account for the crushing difficulties that have plagued her music recently.

Frances has been called a Wunderkind for years, and has embraced the musical career others have foreseen for her. She feels her circumstances are disappointingly ordinary, and she regrets her ‘‘plain American name,’’ wishing she hadn’t been ‘‘born and brought up in just Cincinnati.’’ In contrast, the world... » Complete Wunderkind Summary