The Pianist ( memoir ) The Pianist is a memoir of the Polish composer of Jewish origin Władysław Szpilman , written and elaborated by the Polish author Jerzy Waldorff , who met Szpilman in 1938 in Krynica and became a friend of his . The book is written in the first person , as Szpilman ' s memoir . It tells how Szpilman survived the German deportations of Jews to extermination camp s , the 1943 destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto , and the 1944 Warsaw Uprising during World War II . The book , originally entitled " Death of a City " ( " Śmierć miasta " ) , was first published by the Polish publishing house Wiedza in 1946 . In the introduction to its first edition , Jerzy Waldorff stated that he wrote " as closely as he could " the story told to him by Szpilman , and that he used his brief notes in the process . In the same year , novelists Jerzy Andrzejewski and Czesław Miłosz wrote a screenplay based on it , for the movie called " Robinson of Warsaw " ( " Robinson warszawski " ) . In the next three years a number of drastic revisions were requested by the Communist Party , prompting Miłosz to quit and withdraw his name from the credits . The movie was released during the Conference of Poland ' s Filmographers in Wisła on November 19 – 22 , 1949 and met with a new wave of political criticism . Further revisions were requested and new music commissioned , and the movie was re - released in popular movie theatres in December 1950 under a different title : " Unsubjugated City " ( " Miasto nieujarzmione " ) . Because of Stalinist cultural policy and the ostensibly " grey areas " in which Szpilman ( Waldorff ) asserted that not all Germans were bad and not all of the oppressed were good , the actual book remained sidelined for more than 50 years . The subsequent prints of Szpilman ' s memoir omitted the name of Waldorff altogether and asserted that it was authored by the subject himself . Szpilman was not a writer , according to his own son Andrzej . The latest edition was slightly expanded by Andrzej Szpilman himself and printed under a different title , " The Pianist " . In 1998 , Szpilman ’ s son Andrzej Szpilman republished his father ' s memoir , first in German as " Das wunderbare Überleben " ( " The Miraculous Survival " ) and then in English as " The Pianist " . It was later published in more than 30 languages . In 2002 , Roman Polanski directed a screen version , also called " The Pianist " , but Szpilman died before the film was completed . The movie won three Academy Awards , the British Academy of Film and Television Arts Best Film Award , and the Palme d ' Or at the Cannes Film Festival . Synopsis . Władysław Szpilman studied the piano in the early 1930s in Warsaw and Berlin . In Berlin , he was instructed by Leonid Kreutzer and , at the Berlin Academy of Arts , by Artur Schnabel . During his time at the academy he also studied composition with Franz Schreker . In 1933 , he returned to Warsaw after Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party rose to power in Germany . Upon his return to Warsaw , Szpilman worked as a pianist for Polish Radio until the German invasion of Poland in 1939 . He was forced to stop work at the station when German bombs destroyed the power station that kept Polish Radio running . He played Polish Radio ’ s last ever pre - war live recording ( a Chopin recital ) the day the station went off the air . Only days after Warsaw ’ s surrender , German leaflets appeared , hung on the walls of buildings . These leaflets , issued by the German commandant , promised Poles the protection and care of the German State . There was even a special section devoted to Jews , guaranteeing them that their rights , their property , and their lives would be absolutely secure . At first , these proclamations seemed trustworthy , and opinion was rife that Germany ’ s invasion may have even been a good thing for Poland ; it would restore order to Poland ’ s present state of chaos . But , soon after the taking of the city , popular feeling began to change . The first clumsily organised race raids , in which Jews were taken from the streets into private cars and tormented and abused , began almost immediately after peace had returned to the city . But the occurrence that first outraged the majority of Poles was the murder of a hundred innocent Polish citizens in December 1939 . After this , Polish opinion turned strongly against the occupying army , especially the organisation responsible for the majority of civilian murders , the SS . Soon , decrees applying only to Jews began to be posted around the city . Jews had to hand real estate and valuables over to German officials and Jewish families were only permitted to own 2000 złoty each . The rest had to be deposited in a bank in a blocked account . Unsurprisingly , very few people handed their property over to the Germans willingly in compliance with this decree . Szpilman ’ s family ( he was living with his parents , his brother Henryk , and his sisters Regina and Halina ) were amongst those who did not . They hid their money in the window frame , an expensive gold watch under their cupboard , and the watch ’ s chain beneath the fingerboard of Szpilman ’ s father ’ s violin . By 1940 , many of the roads leading into the area set aside for the ghetto were being blocked off with walls . No reason was given for the construction work . Also in January and February 1940 , the first decrees appeared ordering Jewish men and women each to do two years of labour in concentration camps . These years would serve to cure Jews of being " parasites on the healthy organism of the Aryan peoples " . But the threats of labour camps didn ’ t come into effect until May , when Germany took Paris . Now , having expanded the bounds of the Reich by a significant distance , the Nazis had time to spare to persecute the Jews . Deportation , robberies , murders , and forced labour were stepped up significantly . To avoid the concentration camps , rich , intellectual Jews like Szpilman ’ s family and many of his acquaintances could pay to have poorer Jews deported in their place . These payments would be made to the Judenrat , the Jewish organisation that the Germans had put in charge of arranging the deportation . Most of the money went to supporting the high - cost livelihoods of those at the head of the council . But , for the Jews , the worst was yet to come . In " The Pianist " , Szpilman describes a newspaper article that appeared in October 1940 : A little while later the only Warsaw newspaper published in Polish by the Germans provided an official comment on this subject : not only were the Jews social parasites , they also spread infection . They were not , said the report , to be shut up in a ghetto ; even the word “ ghetto ” was not to be used . The Germans were too cultured and magnanimous a race , said the newspaper , to confine even parasites like the Jews to ghettos , a medieval remnant unworthy of the new order in Europe . Instead , there was to be a separate Jewish quarter of the city where only Jews lived , where they would enjoy total freedom , and where they could continue to practise their racial customs and culture . Purely for hygienic reasons , this quarter was to be surrounded by a wall so that typhus and other Jewish diseases could not spread to other parts of the city . And so the Warsaw Ghetto was formed . The Ghetto . Szpilman ’ s family was lucky to already be living in the ghetto area when the plans were announced . Other families , living outside the boundaries , had to find new homes within the ghetto ’ s confines . They had been given just over a month ’ s warning by the notices and many families were forced to pay exorbitant amounts of money for tiny slums in the bad areas of the ghetto . On 15 November 1940 , the gates of the ghetto were closed . However , this didn ’ t stop the smuggling trade into the “ Jewish Quarter " . Expensive luxury goods as well as food and drink came into the ghetto , heaped in wagons and carts . Although these convoys were not strictly legal , the two men in charge of the business , Kon and Heller ( who were in the service of the Gestapo and through them could run many such ventures ) , paid the guards at the ghetto gate to turn a blind eye at a prearranged time and allow the carts through . There were other , less organised types of smuggling that occurred regularly in the ghetto . Every afternoon ( afternoon was the best time for smuggling as by then the police guarding the wall were tired and uninterested ) carts would pass by the ghetto wall , a whistle would be heard , and bags of staple food would be thrown into the ghetto . The poor inhabitants of the houses by the wall would scamper out of cover , grab the food , and return to their lodgings . Szpilman played piano at an expensive café which pandered to the ghetto ’ s upper class , comprised largely of smugglers and other war profiteer s , and their wives or mistresses . On his way to or from work , Szpilman would sometimes pass by the wall during smuggling hours . In addition to the methods of smuggling mentioned previously , Szpilman observed many child smugglers at work . These smugglers were children who , of their own volition or on the instructions of family members or employers , sneaked out of the ghetto through gutters that ran from the Aryan side of the wall to the Jewish side . Children did the work as they were the only ones small enough to squeeze through without becoming stuck . Once they had gotten to the other side and received their bags of goods , they would return to the ghetto through the gutters . In his memoir , Szpilman describes one of these forays : One day when I was walking along beside the wall I saw a childish smuggling operation that seemed to have reached a successful conclusion . The Jewish child still on the far side of the wall only needed to follow his goods back through the opening . His skinny little figure was already partly in view when he suddenly began screaming , and at the same time I heard the hoarse bellowing of a German on the other side of the wall . I ran to the child to help him squeeze through as quickly as possible , but in defiance of our efforts his hips stuck in the drain . I pulled at his little arms with all my might , while his screams became increasingly desperate , and I could hear the heavy blows struck by the policeman on the other side of the wall . When I finally managed to pull the child through , he died . His spine had been shattered . As time went by , the area of the ghetto was slowly decreased until there was a small ghetto , made up mostly of intelligentsia and middle – upper class , and a large ghetto that held the rest of the Warsaw Jews . Szpilman and his family were fortunate to live in the small ghetto , which was less crowded and dangerous than the other . The large ghetto was reached from the small ghetto by crossing Chłodna Stree in the Aryan part of the city . Again , the experience of those in the bigger ghetto is best described by Szpilman : Dozens of beggars lay in wait for this brief moment of encounter with a prosperous citizen , mobbing him by pulling at his clothes , barring his way , begging , weeping , shouting , threatening . But it was foolish for anyone to feel sympathy and give a beggar something , for then the shouting would rise to a howl . That signal would bring more and more wretched figures streaming up from all sides , and the good Samaritan would find himself besieged , hemmed in by ragged apparitions spraying him with tubercular saliva , by children covered with oozing sores who were pushed into his path , by gesticulating stumps of arms , blinded eyes , toothless , stinking open mouths , all begging for mercy at this , the last moment of their lives , as if their end could be delayed only by instant support . Whenever he went into the large ghetto , Szpilman would visit a friend , Jehuda Zyskind , who worked as a smuggler , trader , driver , or carrier when the need arose . He was also an enthusiastic Socialist . This interest was what eventually led to his and his family ’ s death : shot on the spot by Military Police officers after being caught sorting out a pile of socialist documents , illegally smuggled into the ghetto . But before his death , in the winter of 1942 , Zyskind supplied Szpilman with the latest news from outside the ghetto , received via radio . After hearing this news and completing whatever other business he had in the large ghetto , Szpilman would head back to his house in the small ghetto . On his way , Szpilman would meet up with his brother , Henryk , who made a living by trading books in the street . He would help Henryk to carry the books back to the family house , where they would have lunch . Henryk , like Władysław , was cultured and well educated . Many of his friends advised him , at one time or another , to do as most young men of the intelligentsia and join the Jewish Ghetto Police , an organisation of Jews who worked under the SS , upholding their laws in the ghetto . Henryk , however , refused to work with “ bandits ” . Soon enough , Henryk ’ s decision was proved to have been a wise one . In May 1942 , the Jewish Police began to carry out the task of “ human - hunting ” for the Germans , mistreating Jews almost as viciously as their German employers . Szpilman describes the Jewish Police : You could have said , perhaps , that they caught the Gestapo spirit . As soon as they put on their uniforms and police caps and picked up their rubber truncheons , their natures changed . Now their ultimate ambition was to be in close touch with the Gestapo , to be useful to Gestapo officers , parade down the street with them , show off their knowledge of the German language and vie with their masters in the harshness of their dealings with the Jewish population . During a “ human - hunt ” conducted by the Jewish Police , Henryk was picked up and arrested . As soon as he heard the news of his brother ’ s arrest , Szpilman went to the labour bureau building , determined to secure Henryk ’ s release . His only hope was that his popularity as a pianist would be enough to secure Henryk ’ s release and stop himself from being arrested as well , for none of his papers were in order . Still , Szpilman made his way to the building and , amongst a crowd of prisoners being herded into captivity , managed to find the deputy director of the labour bureau . After much effort , Szpilman managed to extract from him a promise that Henryk would be home by that night , which he was . The rest of the men who had been arrested during the sweep were taken to Treblinka , a German extermination camp , to test the new gas chambers and crematorium furnaces . The Umschlagplatz . On 22 July 1942 , the resettlement plan was first put into action . Buildings , randomly selected from all areas of the Ghetto , were surrounded by German officers leading troops of Jewish Police . The inhabitants were called out , the building was searched , and every single person removed from the building , including babies and old men and women , was loaded into wagons and taken to the Umschlagplatz ( the assembly area ) . From there , Jews were loaded into trains and taken away . Notices posted around the city said that all Jews fit to work were going to the East to work in German factories . They would each be allowed 20 kilograms of luggage , jewelry , and provisions for two days . Only Jewish officials from the Judenräte or other social institutions were exempt from resettlement . In the hope of being allowed to stay in Warsaw if they were useful to the German community , Jews tried to find work at German firms that were recruiting within the ghetto . If they managed to find work , often by paying their employer to hire them , Jews would be issued with certificates of employment . They would pin notices bearing the name of the place where they were working onto their clothing . After six days searching and deal making , Szpilman managed to procure six work certificates , enough for his entire family . At this time , Henryk , Władysław and their father were given work sorting the stolen possessions of Jewish families at the collection centre near the Umschlagplatz . They and the rest of the family were allowed to move into the barracks for Jewish workers at the centre . But , on 16 August 1942 , Szpilman ’ s luck ran out . On that day there was a selection carried out at the collection centre and only Henryk and Halina were passed as fit to work and allowed to stay . The rest of the family was taken to the Umschlagplatz . Soon after they arrived , Szpilman ’ s family was reunited . Henryk and Halina , working in the collection centre , had heard about the plight of the rest of the family and volunteered of their own will to go to the Umschlagplatz . Szpilman was horrified and angered by his siblings ’ headstrong decision , and only accepted their presence after his appeal to the guards had failed to secure their release . The family sat together in the large open space that was the Umschlagplatz . Szpilman describes their last moments together before the train arrived : At one point a boy made his way through the crowd in our direction with a box of sweets on a string round his neck . He was selling them at ridiculous prices , although heaven knows what he thought he was going to do with the money . Scraping together the last of our small change , we bought a single cream caramel . Father divided it into six parts with his penknife . That was our last meal together . That night , at around six o ’ clock , the transports were filled , in preparation for leaving the Umschlagplatz . Szpilman describes his last moments with his family : By the time we had made our way to the train the first trucks were already full . People were standing in them pressed close to each other . SS men were still pushing with their rifle butts , although there were loud cries from inside and complaints about the lack of air . And indeed the smell of chlorine made breathing difficult , even some distance from the trucks . What went on in there if the floors had to be so heavily chlorinated ? We had gone about halfway down the train when I suddenly heard someone shout , ‘ Here ! Here , Szpilman ! ’ A hand grabbed me by the collar , and I was flung back and out of the police cordon . Who dared do such a thing ? I didn ’ t want to be parted from my family . I wanted to stay with them ! My view was now of the closed ranks of the policemen ’ s backs . I threw myself against them , but they did not give way . Peering past the policemen ’ s heads I could see Mother and Regina , helped by Halina and Henryk , clambering into the trucks , while Father was looking around for me . “ Papa ! ” I shouted . He saw me and took a couple of steps my way , but then hesitated and stopped . He was pale , and his legs trembled nervously . He tried to smile , helplessly , painfully , raised his hand and waved goodbye , as if I were setting out into life and he was already greeting me from beyond the grave . Then he turned and went towards the trucks . I flung myself at the policemen ’ s shoulders again with all my might . “ Papa ! Henryk ! Halina ! ” I shouted like someone possessed , terrified to think that now , at the last vital moment , I might not get to them and we would be parted for ever . One of the policemen turned and looked angrily at me . “ What the hell do you think you ’ re doing ? Go on , save yourself ! ” Save myself ? From what ? In a flash I realized what awaited the people in the cattle trucks . My hair stood on end . I glanced behind me . I saw the open compound , the railway lines and platforms , and beyond them the streets . Driven by compulsive animal fear , I ran for the streets , slipped in among a column of Council workers just leaving the place , and got through the gate that way . Death of a City . Szpilman never saw any members of his family again . The train they were on took them to Treblinka . None of them survived the war . Szpilman got work to keep himself safe . His first job was as part of a column of workers the Germans were using to demolish the walls of the large ghetto , for now that most of the Jews there had been deported , it was being reclaimed by the rest of the city . Whilst doing this new work , Szpilman was permitted to go out into the Gentile side of Warsaw . If they could slip away from the wall , Szpilman and the other workers visited Polish food stalls and purchased such staples as potatoes and bread . These precious purchases could either be eaten by the buyer or taken into the ghetto , where their value skyrocketed . By eating some of their food and selling or trading the rest in the ghetto , the men working on the wall could feed themselves adequately and still raise enough money to repeat the exercise the next day . After his work on the wall Szpilman survived another selection in the ghetto and was sent to work on many different tasks , such as cleaning out the yard of the Jewish council building . Eventually , Szpilman was posted to a steady job as " storeroom manager " . In this position , Szpilman organised the stores at the SS accommodation , which his group was preparing . At around this time , the Germans in charge of Szpilman ’ s group decided to allow each man five kilograms of potatoes and a loaf of bread every day , to make them feel more secure under the Germans ; fears of deportation had been running at especially high levels since the last selection . To get this food , the men were allowed to choose a representative to go into the city with a cart everyday and buy it for all of them . To do this they chose a young man known to Szpilman as “ Majorek ” ( Little Major ) . Majorek acted not only to collect food , but as a link between the Jewish resistance in the ghetto and similar organisations outside , as well . Hidden inside his bags of food every day , Majorek would bring weapons and ammunition into the ghetto to be passed on to the resistance by Szpilman and the other workers . Majorek was also a link to Szpilman ’ s Polish friends and acquaintances on the outside ; through Majorek , Szpilman managed to arrange his escape from the ghetto . On February 13 , 1943 , Szpilman slipped through the ghetto gate and met up with his friend Andrzej Bogucki on the other side . As soon as he saw Szpilman coming , Bogucki turned away and began to walk towards the hiding place they had arranged for him . Szpilman followed , careful not to reveal himself as Jewish ( Szpilman had prominent Jewish features ) by straying into the light of a street lamp while a German was passing . Szpilman only stayed in his first hiding place for a few days before he moved on . While hiding in the city , Szpilman had to move many times from flat to flat . Each time he would be provided with food by friends involved in the Polish resistance who , with one or two exceptions , came irregularly but as often as they were able . These months were long and boring for Szpilman ; he passed his time by learning to cook elaborate meals silently and out of virtually nothing , by reading , and by teaching himself English . During this entire period Szpilman lived in fear of capture by the Germans . If he were ever discovered and unable to escape , Szpilman planned to commit suicide so that he would be unable to compromise any of his helpers under questioning . During the months Szpilman spent in hiding , he came extremely close to suicide on several occasions , but never had to carry out his plans . Szpilman continued to live in his various hiding places until August 1944 . In August , the Warsaw Uprising , the Polish underground ' s large - scale effort to fight the German occupiers , began , only weeks after the first Soviet shells had fallen on the city . As a result of this Soviet attack the German authorities had begun tentatively to evacuate the civilian population of the city , but there was still a strong military presence within Warsaw , and this was what the Warsaw rebellion was aimed at . From the window of the flat in which he was hiding , Szpilman had a good vantage point from which to watch the beginnings of the rebellion . Hiding in a predominantly German area , however , Szpilman was not in a good position to go out and join the fighting : first he would need to get past several units of German soldiers who were holding the area against the main power of the rebellion , which was based in the city centre . So Szpilman stayed in his building . However , on August 12 , 1944 , the German search for the culprits behind the rebellion reached Szpilman ’ s building . It was surrounded by Ukrainian fascists and the inhabitants were ordered to evacuate before the building was destroyed . A tank fired a couple of shots into the building and then it was set alight . Szpilman , hiding in his flat on the fourth floor , could only hope that the flats on the first floor were the only ones that were burning and that he would be able to escape the flames by staying high . Within hours , however , his room began to fill with smoke and he began to experience the beginning effects of carbon monoxide poisoning . Now , Szpilman was resigned to dying . To quicken his passing , Szpilman decided to commit suicide . To do this , he planned on swallowing first sleeping pills and then a bottle of opium to finish himself off . But he didn ’ t manage to see his plans through to completion . As soon as he took the sleeping pills , which acted almost instantly on his empty stomach , Szpilman fell asleep . When he woke up , the fire was no longer burning as powerfully . All of the floors below Szpilman ’ s were burnt out to varying degrees , and Szpilman left the building to escape the poisonous smoke that filled all the rooms . He stopped and sat down just outside the building , leaning against a wall to conceal himself from the Germans on the road on the other side . He remained hidden behind the wall , recovering from the poison , until dark . Then he struck out across the road to an unfinished hospital building that had been evacuated already . He crossed the road on hands and knees , lying flat and pretending to be a corpse ( of which there were many on the road ) whenever a German unit came into sight on their way to or from fighting in the city centre . When he eventually reached the hospital , Szpilman collapsed onto the floor in the first available area and fell asleep . The next day , Szpilman explored the hospital thoroughly . To his dismay he found that it was full of items the Germans would be intending to take away with them , meaning he would have to be careful travelling around the building in case a group should come in to loot . To avoid the patrols that occasionally swept the building , Szpilman hid in a lumber room , tucked in a remote corner of the hospital . Food and drink were scarce in the hospital , and for the first four or five days of his stay in the building , Szpilman couldn ’ t find anything . When , again , he went searching for food and drink , Szpilman managed to find some crusts of bread to eat and a fire bucket full of water . Even though the stinking water was covered in an iridescent film , Szpilman drank deeply , although he stopped after inadvertently swallowing a considerable amount of dead insects . On 30 August , Szpilman moved back into his old building , which by this time had entirely burnt out . Here , in larder s and bathtubs ( which , due to the ravages of the fire , were now open to the air ) Szpilman found bread and rainwater , which kept him alive . During his time in this building the Warsaw Uprising was defeated and the evacuation of the civilian population was completed . By October 14 , Szpilman and the German army were all but the only humans still living in Warsaw , which had been completely destroyed by the Germans . As November set in , so did winter . Living in the attic of the block of flats , with very little protection from the cold and the snow , Szpilman began to get extremely cold . As a result of the cold and the squalor , he eventually developed an insatiable craving for hot porridge . So , at great risk , Szpilman came down from the attic to find a working oven in one of the flats . He was still trying to get the stove lit when he was discovered by a German soldier . Szpilman describes the encounter : He was as alarmed as I was by this lonely encounter in the ruins , but he tried to seem threatening . He asked , in broken Polish , what I was doing here . I said I was living outside Warsaw now and had come back to fetch some of my things . In view of my appearance , this was a ridiculous explanation . The German pointed his gun at me and told me to follow him . I said I would , but my death would be on his conscience , and if he let me stay here I would give him half a litre of spirits . He expressed himself agreeable to this form of ransom , but made it very clear that he would be back , and then I would have to give him more strong liquor . As soon as I was alone I climbed quickly to the attic , pulled up the ladder and closed the trapdoor . Sure enough , he was back after quarter of an hour , but accompanied by several other soldiers and a non - commissioned officer . At the sound of their footsteps and voices I clambered up from the attic floor to the top of the intact piece of roof , which had a steep slope . I lay flat on my stomach with my feet braced against the gutter . If it had buckled or given way , I would have slipped to the roofing sheet and then fallen five floors to the street below . But the gutter held , and this new and indeed desperate idea for a hiding place meant that my life was saved once again . The Germans searched the whole building , piling up tables and chairs , and finally came up to my attic , but it did not occur to them to look on the roof . It must have seemed impossible for anyone to be lying there . They left empty - handed , cursing and calling me a number of names . From then on , Szpilman decided to stay hidden on the roof every day , only coming down at dusk to search for food . He planned to go to this extra measure only until the troop of Germans who knew of his hiding place had left the area . However , he was soon forced to change his plans drastically . Lying on the roof one day Szpilman suddenly heard a burst of firing near him . Turning , he saw that it was he that the bullets were aimed at . Two Germans , standing on the roof of the hospital , had discovered his latest hiding spot and had begun to shoot at him . Szpilman slithered , as fast as he could , off the roof and down through the trapdoor into the stairway . Then , as his last hiding place in the building had now been discovered , he hurried out of the building and into the expanse of burnt out buildings . Wilm Hosenfeld . Szpilman headed quickly away from his old building and soon found another , similar building that he could live in . It was the only multi - story building in the area and , as was now his custom , Szpilman made his way up to the attic . Some days later , Szpilman searched the building for food . This time his aim was to collect as much food as possible and take it all up to his attic so he wouldn ’ t have to come down so often and expose himself to danger . He found a kitchen and was raiding it intently when suddenly he was surprised by the voice of a German officer behind him . The officer asked him what he was doing . Szpilman said nothing , but sat down in despair by the larder door . The officer asked him his occupation and Szpilman answered that he was a pianist . On hearing this , the officer led him to a piano in the next room and instructed him to play . Szpilman describes the scene : I played Chopin ’ s Nocturne in C sharp minor . The glassy , tinkling sound of the untuned strings rang through the empty flat and the stairway , floated through the ruins of the villa on the other side of the street and returned as a muted , melancholy echo . When I had finished , the silence seemed even gloomier and even more eerie than before . A cat mewed in a street somewhere . I heard a shot down below outside the building — a harsh , loud German noise . The officer looked at me in silence . After a while he sighed , and muttered , “ All the same , you shouldn ’ t stay here . I ’ ll take you out of the city , to a village . You ’ ll be safer there . ” I shook my head . “ I can ’ t leave this place , ” I said firmly . Only now did he seem to understand my real reason for hiding among the ruins . He started nervously . “ You ’ re Jewish ? ” he asked “ Yes . ” He had been standing with his arms crossed over his chest ; he now unfolded them and sat down in the armchair by the piano , as if this discovery called for lengthy reflection . “ Yes , well , ” he murmured , “ in that case I see you really can ’ t leave . ” The officer went with Szpilman to take a look at his hiding place . Inspecting the attic thoroughly , he found a loft above the attic that Szpilman hadn ’ t noticed as it was in a gloomy area of the roof . He helped Szpilman find a ladder amongst the apartments and helped him climb up into the loft . From then until his unit retreated from Warsaw , the German officer supplied Szpilman with food , water and encouraging news of the Soviet advance . The officer ’ s unit left during the first half of December , 1944 . The officer left Szpilman with food and drink and with a German Army great coat , so he would be warm while he foraged for food until the Soviets arrived . Szpilman had little to offer the officer by way of thanks , but told him that if he should ever need help , that he should ask for the pianist Szpilman of the Polish Radio . The Soviets finally arrived on 15 January 1945 . When the city was liberated , troops began to come in with civilians following after them , alone or in small groups . Szpilman , wishing to be friendly , came out of his hiding place and greeted one of these civilians , a woman carrying a bundle on her back . But , before he had finished speaking , the woman dropped her bundle , turned and fled , shouting that Szpilman was “ A German ! ” Szpilman ran back inside his building . Looking out the window minutes later , Szpilman saw that his building had been surrounded by troops and that they were already making their way in via the cellars . So Szpilman came slowly down the stairs , shouting “ Don ’ t shoot ! I ’ m Polish ! ” A young Polish officer came up the stairs towards him , pointing his pistol and telling him to put his hands up . Again Szpilman said that he was Polish . The officer came and inspected him closer . He eventually agreed that Szpilman was Polish and lowered the pistol . After the war was over , Szpilman was visited by a violinist friend named Zygmunt Lednicki . Lednicki told Szpilman of a German officer he had met at a Soviet Prisoner of War camp on his way back from his wanderings after the defeat of the Warsaw Uprising . The officer , learning that he was a musician , had asked him if he knew Władysław Szpilman . Lednicki had said that he did , but before the German could tell him his name , the guards at the camp had asked Lednicki to move on and sat the German back down again with his fellows . When Szpilman and Lendnicki returned to the place where the POW camp had been , it was no longer there . Although after this disappointment Szpilman did everything in his power to find the officer , it took him five years even to discover his name , Wilm Hosenfeld . From there Szpilman went to the government in an attempt to locate Hosenfeld and secure his release . But Hosenfeld and his unit , which was suspected of spying , had been moved to a POW camp at a secret location somewhere in Soviet Russia , and there was nothing the Polish government could do . Hosenfeld died in captivity in 1952 . After the war . After the war Szpilman resumed his musical career at Radio Poland in Warsaw . His first piece at the newly reconstructed recording room of Radio Warsaw was the same as the last piece he had played six years before . He went on to become the head of Polish Radio ’ s music department until 1963 , when he retired the position to devote more of his time to composing and to touring as a concert pianist . In 1986 , he retired from the latter and became a full - time composer . Szpilman died in Warsaw on 6 July 2000 at the age of 88 . Movie . A 2002 film version was adapted by Ronald Harwood and stars Adrien Brody , Emilia Fox , Thomas Kretschmann and Michał Żebrowski . The story was filmed by Roman Polanski in 2001 . Polanski was awarded the Palme d ' Or ( Golden Palm ) award of the Cannes film festival on May 26 , 2002 . The film eventually premiered in Cannes on May , 2002 . " The Pianist " was nominated for several Academy Awards , including Best Picture . Brody won the Oscar for Best Actor and Polanski the one for Best Director . It has also received the César Award for Best Film in 2003 . Tagline : " Music was his passion . Survival was his masterpiece " . Stage adaptation . As part of the 2007 Manchester International Festival , the memoir was performed as a two - man presentation , with pianist Mikhail Rudy and actor Peter Guinness both portraying Władysław Szpilman as he recounts his experiences . Directed by Neil Bartlett , the performance took place in an oak - beamed 1830s warehouse , which is part of the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester site . Outside the building there are disused railway tracks , recalling the trains that took the Jews from the Ghetto to the concentration camps in Szpilman ' s memoirs . The idea for the performance was originally conceived by the pianist , Mikhail Rudy , who gained the backing of Andrzej Szpilman ( Władysław Szpilman ' s son ) . He also performed at the first concert dedicated to his Szpilman ' s music , where he met all of his living descendants . He was also shown the remains of the real - world settings of Szpilman ' s memoirs by the family , and has remained in contact with them since .