The Little Song of a Girl
A Russian classic criticises war by pointing to the beauty and the love that are lost through it.
Now the apple blossoms are coming out again. Their lush beauty in spring feels like a symbol for the emotional life of young lovers. They bloom in Russia too, and in 1938 a Russian poet used them as the hook for a very famous and beloved song: Katjuscha. Anyone to whom that means nothing at first will nonetheless recognise the sad yet buoyant melody. We know that soon after that year German troops marched into Russia. Like every war, this one too tore many loving couples apart. From the perspective of a girl left behind, the song addresses ― seemingly naive and, precisely for that reason, deeply moving ― the love, the beauty that was lost, the anxious hope of seeing again the beloved who had to go off to war.
There are songs that address the horrors of war, the injustice that it is never the people who go to war who, as decision-makers, are responsible for this suffering. There are songs that describe the deaths of sons and fathers and the grief of mothers. And then there is: Katjuscha.
The song speaks of love, of the beauty of nature. Of the longing one feels when a beloved person is out of reach. A young girl, blossoming apple trees, a love letter. And yet, through the words, one senses that it is precisely not a love song. For me it never was.
My memories of the song and its melody reach far back into my childhood. The song does not speak of war, of suffering. It does not address death and grief – on the contrary: in an almost naive-seeming way, it conveys the pain that loving people feel when they are separated. Perhaps it was precisely this naivety that touched me so deeply. How simple it would be to live in peace, if loving people did not have to part.
Amid a blossoming landscape, Katjuscha reads a letter from her beloved, sings of his love, which she keeps safe in her heart. Her song is an answer to his lines from far away.
The Russian song was written in 1938, shortly before the Second World War broke out and German troops marched into the Soviet Union. Did Katjuscha ever see her beloved again?
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