My father had watched the Academy Award-winning film “The Song of Bernadette” during the mid-1950s. The film recounted the story of Lourdes and its beloved Saint Bernadette. During a pilgrimage to Holy Land and Europe in 1993, my parents had the opportunity to visit to Lourdes. The experience of a purifying dip in the cold waters of Lourdes greatly affected my father too. He desired to know more about the life of Saint Bernadette.
Much later, he got a copy of the book ‘The Song of Bernadette’ by Franz Werfel on which an Academy Award winning film was based and read it at least three times. My father was greatly influenced by this book and recommended it to all his grandchildren whenever he met them.
Who was Franz Werfel, the author of the book?
Frank Werfel (1890-1945), a Czech-born, Jewish author, was a highly respected literary figure in Vienna and an outspoken critic of Hitler when Nazis occupied Austria in 1938. He escaped to France and found solace and help in the town of Lourdes, where he learnt about Bernadette and the 1858 apparitions. When Nazis invaded France and began deporting Jews to death camps, he was forced to flee again. As he narrowly escaped, he promised God that if he made it safely to America, he would “sing the song” of Bernadette. He kept his promise and his novel became an international bestseller and an Academy Award-winning movie.
In the preface of the book, Franz Werfel explains the motivation for writing this book in his own words.
“…In the last days of June 1940, in flight from our mortal enemies after the collapse of France, we reached the city of Lourdes. The two of us, my wife and I, had hoped to be able to elude them in time to cross the Spanish frontier to Portugal. But since the consuls unanimously refused the requisite visas, we had no alternative but to flee back with great difficulty to the interior of France on the very night on which the National Socialist troops occupied the border town of Hendaye. The Pyrenean department had turned into a phantasmagoria – a very camp of chaos. The millions of this strange migration of peoples wandered about on roads and obstructed the towns and villages: Frenchmen, Belgians, Dutchmen, Poles, Czechs, Austrians, exiled Germans, and mingled with these, soldiers of the defeated armies, there was barely food enough to still the extreme pangs of hunger. There was no shelter to be had at all. Anyone who had obtained possession of an upholstered chair for his night’s rest was an object of envy. In endless lines stood the cars of the fugitives, piled mountain-high with household gear, with mattresses and beds; there was no gasoline to be had. In Pau a family settled there told us that Lourdes was the place where if luck were kind, one might still find a roof. Since the famous city was but thirty kilometres distant, we were advised to make the attempt and knock at its gates. It was in this manner that Providence brought me to Lourdes, of the miraculous history of which I had hitherto the most superficial knowledge. We hid for several weeks in the Pyrenean city. It was a time of great dread.
But it was also a time of great significance for me, for I became acquainted with the wondrous facts of the girl Bernadette Soubirouus and also with the wondrous facts concerning the healing of Lourdes. One day in my great distress I made a vow. I vowed that if I escaped from this desperate situation and reached the saving shores of America, I would put off all other tasks and sing as best as I could the song of Bernadette.”
The Film
The black and white film with the same title as the book was released in 1943. It won four Academy and three Golden Globe Awards. You too can watch the full movie by clicking on this youtube link