Historical Analysis of 'The Painted Bird'

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An obscure village in Poland, sheltered from ideas and industrialization, seemed a safe

place to store one's most precious valuable: a 6-year-old boy. Or so it seemed to the

parents who abandoned their only son to protect him from the Nazis in the beginning of

Jerzy Kosinski's provocative 1965 novel The Painted Bird. After his guardian Marta dies

and her decaying corpse and hut are accidentally engulfed in flames, the innocent

young dark-haired, dark-eyed outcast is obliged to trek from village to village in search

of food, shelter, and companionship. Beaten and caressed, chastised and ignored, the

unnamed protagonist survives the abuse inflicted by men, women, children and beasts

to be reclaimed by his parents 7 years later-a cold, indifferent, and callous individual.

The protagonist's experiences and observations demonstrate that the Holocaust was

far too encompassing to be contained within the capsule of Germany with its sordid

concentration camps and sociopolitical upheaval. Even remote and "backward" villages

of Poland were exposed and sucked into the maelstrom of conflict. The significance of

this point is that it leads to another logical progression: Reaching further than the

Polish villages of 1939, the novel's implications extend to all of us. Not only did Hitler's

stain seep into even the smallest crannies of the world at that time, it also spread

beyond limits of time and culture. Modern readers, likewise, are implicated because of

our humanity. The conscientious reader feels a sense of shame at what we, as humans,

are capable of through our cultural mentalities. That is one of the more profound

aspects of Kosinski's work.

It is this sense of connectedness between cultures, people, and ideas that runs

through the book continuously. While the "backward" nonindustrialized villages of Poland

seem at first glance to contrast sharply with "civilized" Nazi Germany, Kosinski shows

that the two were actually linked by arteries of brutality and bigotry. Both cultures

used some form of religious ideology to enforce a doctrine of hate upon selected groups

whom they perceived to be inferior. Totalitarian rhetoric and Nietzschian existentialism

replace a hybrid of Catholicism, which in turn replaces medieval superstition as the

protagonist is carried from the innards of village life to the heart of totalitarian power.

In the first several chapters of the novel the little protagonist is firmly convinced that

demons and devils are part of the tangible, physical world. He actually sees them. They

are not mythological imaginings confined to a fuzzy spiritual world. They are real, and

he believes the villagers' insistences that he is possessed by them. The peasants use

these superstitious beliefs to enforce a doctrine of hate upon the boy. Even their dogs

seem to believe in this credo, chasing, biting, and barking at him as if a viciousness

towards dark-haired boys is programmed into their genetic makeup.

The text of the villagers' behavior reads like a gruesome car accident on the side of the

road at which one cannot help but crane one's neck. It is both repulsive and

compelling; one reads in a state of disbelief and horror. The cruelty, moreover, isn't

limited to Jews and Gypsies. Anyone getting in the way is targeted. The rule of weak

over strong prevails and justifies any actions taken against those unfortunate enough

to incite anger.

A stirring example of this phenomenon is when the protagonist witnesses a jealous miller

gouging out the eyes of his wife's "lust interest," an otherwise innocuous 14-year-old

plowboy whose only sin was in staring too fixedly at a woman's bosom:

"And with a rapid movement such as women used to gouge out the rotten spots while

peeling potatoes, he plunged the spoon into one of the boy's eyes and twisted it.

"The eye sprang out of his face like a yolk from a broken egg and rolled down the

miller's hand onto the floor. The plowboy howled and shrieked, but the miller's hold kept

him pinned against the wall.

Then the blood-covered spoon plunged into the other eye, which sprang out even

faster. For a moment the eye rested on the boy's cheek as if uncertain what to do

next; then it finally tumbled down his shirt onto the floor."

The peasants' behavior demonstrates that Hitler simply harnessed preexisting attitudes.

Even Poland, seemingly neutral and exploited as it was, absorbed distrustful attitudes

toward Jews and Gypsies and felt no qualms about taking aggressions out violently on

weaker people. Everyone, to a certain extent, bought into this bigotry. It left not even

the most remote areas untouched.

As the novel progresses, the protagonist changes environments and subsequently

alters his religious beliefs. He realizes (during the intervals when he is not being ravaged

by a savage dog unleashed upon him by the man he is staying with) that

prayer-Catholicism-is the answer to all his troubles. If he can only say enough Hail

Mary's, all his misfortunes will disappear. Surely the Lord will hear him as he stores up

indulgences in heaven as in a bank, guaranteeing himself both literal and spiritual

salvation. But his prayers never save him from cruelty and brutality. The more he prays,

in fact, the worse things seem to get. But, he reasons, Catholicism is a much more

rational religion than those silly superstitions with their foul magical potions that never

seem to work. It's a step in the right direction. Even if his prayers aren't being

answered immediately, at least he's assured a space in heaven.

Catholicism, likewise, was used by the peasants to persecute the protagonist. He is

chased out of the church by an angry mob after he accidentally drops a sacred book

during his short-lived stint as an altar boy. Clearly, they use the accident as an excuse

to exercise hate towards him. He is accused of being possessed by the devil, and the

fact that his small frame staggers under the weight of the massive book is proof.

Catholicism, with respect to its members' compassion, is no different than medieval

superstition. There is no Christian love in this church. In the words of Nietzsche, "God is

dead."

Finally the protagonist is taken up by the Red Army, exposed to books and new ideas,

and convinced that God and devils, demons and heaven and hell are all simply figments

of the imagination, used by people with power to get masses of people to do what they

want. He reacts against Catholicism with the same violent revulsion with which he

reacted against superstition. He feels incredibly foolish for having believed such

groundless ideas that had nothing to do with facts:

"Recalling some of the phrases in those prayers, I felt cheated. They were, as Gavrila

said, filled only with meaningless words. Why hadn't I realized it sooner?"

With no God, there are no stone tablets from which to derive morality. The protagonist

comes to the realization that each man makes his own morality, and whatever actions

he commits within that reality are justified because he is carrying out his own system

of values, ideals, beliefs. The best reality is that of the Communist Party, he learns,

who alone are capable of knowing what is best for the masses: "The Party members

stood at that social summit from which human actions could be seen not as

meaningless jumbles, but as part of a definite pattern."

In one scene the protagonist's kindly mentor and role model, Mitka-a grandfather

figure-calmly fires a high powered machine gun at a distant villager who is sleepily

stretching his arms in the sunlight-strewn hours of early morning. The admiring

protagonist is amazed. He understands that Mitka's action is justified because he is

superior, a member of the Party. Revenge is justified. We see from this that cruelty still

exists: it has simply changed form. What ties the villagers' superstitions together with

totalitarianism is best stated in the prologue of The Painted Bird: "The only law [in the

villages] was the traditional right of the stronger and wealthier over the weaker and

poorer." .

One can't help but question the progress of the protagonist's moral character at the

conclusion of the novel. He is cruel and indifferent to other people's suffering. Even as

his parents finally come for him, he breaks the fingers of his newly adopted four year

old brother without feeling the least bit of sympathy or remorse for his action. Clearly,

his philosophy has become a kind of social Darwinism: eat or be eaten. Survival of the

fittest.

What makes this book so complex is that no morals seem to be propounded. The

reader, along with the protagonist, is left sprawling on a gigantic icy slab of chaotic

relativism, his moral knees knocked out from under him. He must rely on others to teach

him, but everyone has something different to tell him. We find that cruelty is made

understandable, love is perverted. Even sex is reduced to the basest elements: animals

copulating are no more base, no more beautiful than humans. There is no distinction

between man and beast. The two, in fact, are often fused together and/or confused,

each taking on the qualities of the other.

In a Never Ending Storyish kind of way, the reader often finds him/herself transplanted

into the innocent mind and young helpless body of the protagonist: through his

suffering, his joys, his bitterness and ambivalence. It is this transplantation that makes

the book so difficult to endure, and so irresistibly lucid and compelling. I felt terrible and

sad, angry at the world and at the cruelty that one human being will do to another. I

found myself questioning the meaning of things right along with the protagonist.

Kosinski achieves the difficult task of inspiring sympathy without thrusting dogmatic

ideals into the reader's head.

It is understandable to take a depressing view of the world from the circumstances

presented in the novel. Reality is turned upside down and inside out, its guts laid bare

for all to see, and finally casually gotten used to and embraced by the main character.

One critic puts forth this nihilistic interpretation of the Painted Bird.

Poore states in his review:

"[The protagonist] grew in his bitter wisdom immeasurably. The blows he could not

escape he endured. These were the cost-sheets of survival in a senselessly brutal

world. And when his turn came to take some unfair advantage, he took it. "That, Mr.

Kosinski seems to be telling us, is how things are in our world. People who are treated

unjustly do not invariably treat others justly. People who are discriminated against in

turn may be found discriminating against others."

Unlike a Stephen King novel, however, the book avoids being cast into the genre of

cheap horror thrills because at the same time it creates a deep sense of beauty and

social responsibility while paradoxically indicting the reader as being not much different

than the murderous villagers. One critic writes of this phenomenon by ascribing to

Kosinski the ability to create open-ended symbols which achieve the difficult effect of

mirroring whatever attitudes the reader brings into the book. That, he explains, is why

people have such differing views on the novel, ranging from horror filled to

awe-inspired. This critic went on to say that, because each viewer makes the work

his/her own, he/she therefore is held accountable to his/her own interpretation of the

work. He states, "For them, in fact, these texts become a test of courage-whether or

not they can recognize themselves as not only the victims of language but also as the

murderers."

Several other critics emphasized the book's concentration on grim and grotesque

realities. Bauke repeatedly stresses the author's mastery over painting the black tones

of the protagonist's harsh existence.

"It is a book of terrifying impact, replete with scenes of sadism rarely matched in

contemporary writing," he writes. "Mr. Kosinski evokes with the grim precision of a

dream a world of Gothic monstrosities."

While suffering and cruelty are, indeed, major recurring themes throughout the book,

beauty in its purity and innocence is also depicted generously and with great texture.

Sometimes the beauty is even interwoven with what many would otherwise see as

ugly. This is evident in the protagonists' first guardian, Marta. Marta is an ambivalent

figure, at best. She is ugly, foul smelling, and often ignorant of the protagonist's

suffering. On the other hand, she occasionally expresses an endearing sort of

sentimentality toward him, raking her long scraggly nails along his head affectionately.

She also attempts to heal him when he is ill, mixing vile treatments for him to drink such

as "the juice of a squeezed onion, the bile of a billygoat or rabbit, and a dash of raw

vodka." Despite her odd, vomit-inducing ways, the reader still gets a sense of her

dedication: she cares.

The Painted Bird's historical contributions lie not in the realm of factual, unbiased,

detail-laden information, but in giving us a new way of thinking about the facts that we

already have. Most history books tend to focus only on the external aspects of Hitler's

Nazi party's rise to power, focusing on each country as if it was an entity of itself,

individualizing the nations as if they were so many bickering ten-year-olds in the

playground of the world. Few books focus on the internal orders of such countries as

Poland. Peasants played a major role in ethnic extermination as well by condoning, and

often perpetuating, Hitler's hate. More than that, however, the book's slow panorama

of superstition, Catholicism, and existentialism give us a three-dimensional

understanding of all the myriad of ideas that were floating around at that time. We

understand them from the mind of a child, we apply them to the experiences we see

him having. And if we closely examine them, we'll find that such ideas are still in the air

today-that it is possible for something like the Holocaust to happen again if

circumstances are arranged just so. Bosnia, for example, resounds with the echo of the

Nazis' boots.

One of the greatest aspects of fiction is that, in many senses, it is always alive. It

changes just as history and the people who write it change. As each generation comes

of age, they are able to write history-and also fiction-according to their cultural values

and beliefs. The beauty of Kosinski's work is that he allows us to do this. Through his

loosely constructed symbolism, readers can continually apply his fiction to modern

interpretations. At the same time, however, Kosinski holds us accountable through his

graphic, disturbing realistic depiction of what humans are capable of and have, in fact,

done. Perhaps if enough people are touched, they can, indeed, prevent scenes like

these from occurring again. In this sense, Kosinski's work is a gift to humanity. It is a

gift to the future.