I'm madly in love with Jackie

I think I am in love with Jacqueline duPre. Not to worry about the state of my current union, since the divine cellist died in 1987, but her almost visceral allure for me lingers on and can be repeated any time I want, just by listening to her rendering of Elgar's Cello Concerto, and feeling the hairs stand up on the back of my neck, and tears come to my eyes. Tears for the sheer beauty of the piece, tears for her interpretation of the piece, tears for the soul gripping sound of a cello when well-played, and especially when well-played by a beautiful woman (and all cellists should be female, in my esteem, though I am not quite certain why, and tears from the knowledge that this musical genius was plucked from us by the ravages of multiple sclerosis, and quit this vale of tears at the tender age of 42, having been rendered unable to play for many years before she succumbed in 1987.

MS is a brutal and cruel destroyer of vital young people. I know. I don't know from being so afflicted, but from having been married to a woman who was (and is). Her's is not the galloping pernicious kind that so devastated Ms duPre, but of the lingering, attacking-remitting sort that hits without warning and leaving her never knowing if she will stumble and fall, or if she'll keep her underwear dry during a day at work. It's cruel. Whatever problems my ex and I may have had, I was always struck by her courage in the face of this nasty chronic condition. And, as an aside, the illness had absolutely nothing to do with the ultimate demise of our marriage. There were other and unrelated issues afoot therein, and I'll say nothing more about that.

But, back to Jackie. If you are interested in the woman, and she warrants as much interest as you want to give, assuredly see the film Hilary and Jackie, which was based on the remembrances of her nearly equally brilliant sister, Hilary. And, read the book Genius in the Family, more reminiscences of Jackie by Hilary and her brother, Piers duPre.

What is great about their remembrances of this amazing person is that she wasn't always lovable. She was temperamental, she was exasperating, she had a difficult time keeping her undies in place when certain males (including her sister's partner) were around. She was ego-driven and maddening. She was, in other words, a genius, and geniuses are never easy.

But a genius who can speak through the ages and provide such balm for the soul as Jackie, bow in hand, and cello between her shapely legs (and yes, she played it like she was making love to it, by the suggestion of many), could do, must be forgiven all excesses and temperamental displays. She had the right in a world filled with the banal and the gormless who pass themselves off as talents.

Anyway, I love her, and won't hear a bad word about her.