WEBVTT - Olga Janina: “La Cosaque” 0:00:01.680 --> 0:00:05.320 Welcome to Criminalia, a production of Shonda Land Audio in 0:00:05.400 --> 0:00:15.600 partnership with I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to another 0:00:15.640 --> 0:00:19.040 episode of Criminalia. This season, we're exploring the lives and 0:00:19.120 --> 0:00:22.480 motivations of some of the most notorious stalkers throughout history. 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:27.120 I'm Maria Tremarqi and I'm Holly Fry. Today we are 0:00:27.160 --> 0:00:30.440 going to talk about a woman named Olga Janina, and 0:00:30.480 --> 0:00:34.360 although she was a pianist herself, Olga is probably best 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:37.920 known for her obsession with one of the greatest pianists 0:00:37.960 --> 0:00:42.000 of all time, Franz List. Before we can really get 0:00:42.000 --> 0:00:44.960 into olga story, we actually need to talk about List 0:00:45.080 --> 0:00:47.519 because you need to know about who he was to 0:00:47.680 --> 0:00:53.000 understand how we get to this Stocking story. List was 0:00:53.040 --> 0:00:56.280 born in October of eighteen eleven, and he was born 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:59.560 in a small town in Hungary, which actually after World 0:00:59.640 --> 0:01:02.480 War One and became part of Austria. He was a 0:01:02.560 --> 0:01:06.080 child prodigy, and his father was inspired by the life 0:01:06.080 --> 0:01:09.319 of another child prodigy, whom you know as wolf Gang 0:01:09.319 --> 0:01:12.479 Amadeus Mozart. He moved to the family to Vienna, where 0:01:12.480 --> 0:01:15.240 his son could study with the great composers and pianists 0:01:15.240 --> 0:01:20.480 of the time, including Mozart's rival Antonio Saltieri. About a 0:01:20.560 --> 0:01:23.040 year later, the family moved to Paris, where lists father 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:25.480 thought there would be more opportunity for his son to 0:01:25.680 --> 0:01:29.640 play and learn. On March nine of eighteen thirty two, 0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:33.000 List for the first time saw a performance by violinist 0:01:33.080 --> 0:01:37.360 Niccolo Paganini. And we know that specific date because this 0:01:37.480 --> 0:01:41.080 was a magical moment for List, who was about twenty 0:01:41.120 --> 0:01:43.920 one is years old at the time, and this was 0:01:43.959 --> 0:01:47.680 the moment that he knew he could and would push 0:01:47.760 --> 0:01:52.680 himself to become a virtuoso pianist. Between eighteen thirty nine 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:56.360 to eighteen forty seven, which puts him between the ages 0:01:56.400 --> 0:02:00.760 of twenty and thirty six, List did indeed become known 0:02:00.880 --> 0:02:03.880 as a virtuoso pianist, which means he was a master 0:02:04.160 --> 0:02:07.720 at his craft. And it's this period that solidified him 0:02:07.760 --> 0:02:10.360 as the greatest pianist of all time. And we're talking 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:14.519 about then and still today. And Liszt was part of 0:02:14.560 --> 0:02:17.120 the movement known as the Romantic Era. We've talked about 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:20.000 this a little before. It fell between eighteen fifteen and 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:24.919 nineteen ten, and artists during this time, including composers, were 0:02:25.040 --> 0:02:29.240 establishing new stylistic and technical standards, and List became a 0:02:29.280 --> 0:02:33.400 major influence in this movement. His works had a measurable 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:37.040 impact not only during the nineteenth century, but also on 0:02:37.080 --> 0:02:40.760 how classical music has been composed and performed ever since. 0:02:41.400 --> 0:02:43.880 Some of the other more recognizable names of this era, 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:48.040 just to give you some context, are Mendelssohn, Brahms, and Tschaikovsky. 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:52.080 During his lifetime, List was considered to be bombastic, both 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:54.040 in his art and how he lived his life, And 0:02:54.080 --> 0:02:57.880 that word bombastic comes up all the time when you're 0:02:57.880 --> 0:03:01.440 researching him. It's every book. I feel like if you 0:03:01.560 --> 0:03:05.000 did a list drinking game with bombastic, you would be 0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:07.320 a train wreck. At the end of each chap, you'd 0:03:07.360 --> 0:03:14.000 be staying over you can. So he was talented, and 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:18.040 he was influential as a composer, a pianist, teacher, conductor. 0:03:18.080 --> 0:03:20.120 I mean, the list is huge. He was even an author. 0:03:20.600 --> 0:03:24.560 But perhaps above all of that, he was a talented showman, 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:28.399 and he was known to have a larger than life personality. 0:03:29.000 --> 0:03:35.760 His performances became a combination of skill and flamboyance. So 0:03:35.840 --> 0:03:39.600 most people probably don't think about classical music and musicians 0:03:39.680 --> 0:03:44.000 in this way, but List was super famous. If you're 0:03:44.040 --> 0:03:48.200 wondering just how famous we mean. He inspired something that 0:03:48.280 --> 0:03:52.840 became known as list Domania. Yes, just like Beatlemania. It 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:56.160 was more than a century before the Beatles. Like this 0:03:56.280 --> 0:04:02.400 really is the first hyper attentive of manic fandom. Right, 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.000 this is the thing. This is the first time that 0:04:05.080 --> 0:04:10.240 people went nuts. And his concerts were part of this 0:04:10.360 --> 0:04:14.640 because they were like nothing that anyone had seen before. Right, So, 0:04:15.120 --> 0:04:19.680 before List, it was considered to be in bad taste 0:04:19.839 --> 0:04:23.400 if a musician played a song from memory. There's an 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:26.200 anecdote actually that we came across where Chopin, who was 0:04:26.200 --> 0:04:29.560 actually a very good friend of List, He's quoted saying 0:04:29.640 --> 0:04:33.039 that playing from memory was arrogant and that doing so 0:04:33.120 --> 0:04:35.279 would make it appear that you were pretending that the 0:04:35.320 --> 0:04:38.520 composition you were playing was one of your own. But 0:04:38.680 --> 0:04:42.720 list List did not rely on sheet music because with 0:04:42.800 --> 0:04:44.919 the way he played, reading from a page would have 0:04:44.920 --> 0:04:48.000 been a difficult proposition. But it was also a really 0:04:48.040 --> 0:04:53.920 good way to cause a big stir. Yeah, Chopin, bless him, 0:04:54.080 --> 0:04:58.080 was so reserved. I could see where he would be like, frauds, 0:04:58.120 --> 0:05:05.800 what are you doing? Have another beer? Like I'm playing right, 0:05:06.040 --> 0:05:09.040 Because he thought that his performances should be more than 0:05:09.040 --> 0:05:12.800 a recital. By the way, that term recital is something 0:05:12.839 --> 0:05:15.720 that List coined. It seems kind of in the pejorative, 0:05:15.839 --> 0:05:21.039 but he really viewed his shows as theatrical events that 0:05:21.080 --> 0:05:24.000 were more than just the music. And if playing from 0:05:24.000 --> 0:05:28.960 memory was bad, who then this was the worse. Unlike 0:05:29.120 --> 0:05:33.640 any other pianist in his day or before him, Liz 0:05:33.839 --> 0:05:36.320 played his piano in such a way on stage that 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:39.919 the audience could see his face while he was playing 0:05:39.960 --> 0:05:45.479 for them. Oh my god, you know I was reading that. 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:48.560 He actually also was the first person to walk from 0:05:48.560 --> 0:05:52.039 the wings out to sit down on his piano, and 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:55.280 that too was scandal Like. I will say this, if 0:05:55.320 --> 0:05:58.640 you've looked at historical portraits of List, particularly in his 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:01.839 younger years, you would want to look at that face 0:06:01.880 --> 0:06:05.360 as much as possible. He was incredibly beautiful. Yes, and 0:06:05.400 --> 0:06:09.600 the long locks in any way, we'll get going. We're 0:06:09.680 --> 0:06:12.680 just gonna wax rhapsodic about the handsomeness of Franz. I'm 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:17.880 pretty sure I would have been a groupie myself. Um So, 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:21.480 in addition to facing the audience when he played for them, 0:06:21.560 --> 0:06:24.280 he was also very physical when he played the piano, 0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:26.599 and like I said, he had long walks, and his 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:29.560 long hair would often become slick with sweat, and he'd 0:06:29.560 --> 0:06:31.400 whip it around as he played, and I kind of 0:06:31.400 --> 0:06:34.200 like to think that it was kind of early headbanging 0:06:34.279 --> 0:06:37.320 that was going on behind the piano. It would be 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:41.840 accurate to say that. List Ultimately, he just captivated his audience. 0:06:41.880 --> 0:06:46.800 So women swooned and they screamed, and allegedly they threw 0:06:46.839 --> 0:06:50.240 their nineteenth century under garments at him during his performance, 0:06:50.279 --> 0:06:53.680 although that had to be kind of a a bit 0:06:53.720 --> 0:06:56.960 to get off, right. That's a tricky proposition. If you've 0:06:57.080 --> 0:07:00.800 never worn pantlets and a sit over it, you know 0:07:00.880 --> 0:07:04.080 they don't just like, it's not an easy undressing situation. 0:07:04.160 --> 0:07:06.080 That's not just coming through your sleeve like you know, 0:07:11.360 --> 0:07:15.640 um okay. So, for example, one woman who was sort 0:07:15.680 --> 0:07:18.520 of skulking around him and she ended up pouring the 0:07:18.560 --> 0:07:22.280 remaining tea from his teacup into her scent bottle, which 0:07:22.320 --> 0:07:24.080 was popular at the time. He carried with you. It 0:07:24.120 --> 0:07:27.480 wasn't something weird, and just like more modern artists on 0:07:27.520 --> 0:07:30.520 the celebrity level of say like a Mick Jagger or 0:07:30.840 --> 0:07:33.920 a David Bowie, there were stories of women not just 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:37.280 throwing their clothing onto the stage, but also stealing things 0:07:37.280 --> 0:07:40.640 from him, like that tea and his teacup, or you know, 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:43.560 slightly chopping locks of his hair off so he wouldn't notice, 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:46.480 or taking just whatever they could get their hands on 0:07:46.560 --> 0:07:50.760 from him. Yeah, I I feel like I have read 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:53.680 accounts where even things like cigarette butts that he had 0:07:53.680 --> 0:07:57.200 touched they would take yep, and like in their cleavage 0:07:57.280 --> 0:08:00.080 and like, because yeah, I read the same thing. It 0:08:00.160 --> 0:08:06.360 was obsessive mania, for sure. They screamed and swooned. And 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:08.600 it might not surprise you that among all of the 0:08:08.680 --> 0:08:11.440 things he was, including all of those very productive and 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:17.040 artistic accomplishments, he was also really polarizing. Yeah, a little 0:08:17.040 --> 0:08:22.120 bit scooch. His friend German composer Ludwig von Beethoven called him, 0:08:22.240 --> 0:08:25.760 and we're quoting young Turk, because of the rebellious and 0:08:25.800 --> 0:08:29.960 revolutionary way that he had about him. Clara Schumann, who 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:32.880 is regarded as one of the most distinguished pianists of 0:08:32.920 --> 0:08:36.120 the Romantic era, dismissed him as and this is a 0:08:36.240 --> 0:08:39.760 great quote that we both love, the smasher of pianos. 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:43.640 And that is a great quote because he actually was 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:48.000 a smatcher of pianos. His aggressive playing style came to 0:08:48.040 --> 0:08:50.720 be known as and I'm gonna quote this musical combat. 0:08:52.480 --> 0:08:55.680 So imagine you're watching him facing you from the stage, 0:08:55.679 --> 0:08:58.240 and this is going on, and it looked like he 0:08:58.360 --> 0:09:01.160 was attacking his instrument when he played, and he would 0:09:01.200 --> 0:09:04.440 often break the strings of pianos and damage the keys. 0:09:04.920 --> 0:09:07.000 As an interesting aside, pianos were actually a little bit 0:09:07.000 --> 0:09:09.880 more delicate than than they are today, but it's not 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:12.920 like they were made out of cardboard piano. But you 0:09:12.960 --> 0:09:17.040 can also thank his performances for being the inspiration for 0:09:17.120 --> 0:09:23.200 manufacturers to improve and FOURTI five piano construction. And there 0:09:23.280 --> 0:09:26.480 is an account about his playing style that was relayed 0:09:26.520 --> 0:09:29.840 after someone had witnessed a performance he gave in Vienna. 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:32.880 So imagine you have a ticket to see the amazing 0:09:32.920 --> 0:09:36.040 fronts list, and you enter the theater and you find 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:38.760 your seat, and as you settle in, you notice that 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:43.400 on stage there are three pianos. Will there be guest artists? 0:09:43.400 --> 0:09:47.839 You might wonder m guests, but not so much. Liszt 0:09:47.920 --> 0:09:51.240 would use all three pianos, playing one after the other, 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:54.720 as he broke each of the first two with his 0:09:54.840 --> 0:09:58.600 dynamic and very passionate technique. In a letter to one 0:09:58.640 --> 0:10:00.760 of his mistresses, he wrote a out that show and 0:10:00.760 --> 0:10:05.360 he wrote, quote, my concert has just finished. Enthusiasm impossible 0:10:05.400 --> 0:10:11.040 to describe. That night he received eighteen curtain calls, and 0:10:11.080 --> 0:10:13.480 then he was ultimately carried out of the theater by 0:10:13.520 --> 0:10:18.560 his adoring fans. Eighteen curtain goals. That that concert go 0:10:18.600 --> 0:10:21.319 on to like four in the morning, like you know, right, 0:10:23.360 --> 0:10:27.000 So no one had seen anything like this before, and 0:10:27.080 --> 0:10:30.880 the ever growing hysteria that surrounded List became known, as 0:10:30.920 --> 0:10:35.839 we mentioned earlier, as listomania. So besides destroying pianos that 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:39.760 we really can't be sure if he also vandalized hotel rooms, 0:10:39.800 --> 0:10:44.240 as one might do today. There's never any mention of it. 0:10:44.240 --> 0:10:46.480 I believe he was polite to hotel I believe he 0:10:46.520 --> 0:10:48.520 was too. I did see that he was polite to 0:10:48.559 --> 0:10:51.720 people who he rode with as well in carriages. I 0:10:51.760 --> 0:10:53.480 think it was just the pianos that he took it 0:10:53.520 --> 0:10:57.600 all out on. We are going to take a quick 0:10:57.600 --> 0:10:59.600 break here, but when we come back, we are going 0:10:59.640 --> 0:11:02.440 to start talking about the groupies that all of this 0:11:03.080 --> 0:11:17.240 bombastic playing attracted. Welcome back to Criminaliot. So let's talk 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:22.200 now about nineteen century rock stars and their groupies. So 0:11:22.280 --> 0:11:25.200 there were ways in which Frant's list lived up to 0:11:26.040 --> 0:11:28.600 the rock star image. Even then, he was a bit 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:31.720 of a playboy and he had numerous liaisons with women. 0:11:32.360 --> 0:11:35.040 He never married, but he did come close once. Of 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:38.160 his many affairs, there are two women that stood out 0:11:38.160 --> 0:11:43.079 in his life, Marie Dagou and the Princess Caroline designed Wittgenstein. 0:11:44.080 --> 0:11:46.360 Liszt and Marie were together for about a decade. They 0:11:46.400 --> 0:11:50.040 actually had three children together, and when that relationship ended, 0:11:50.640 --> 0:11:54.920 Marie decided to publish a then scandalous novel under the 0:11:54.960 --> 0:11:58.319 male pseudonym Daniel Stern. So this is one of those 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:04.320 instances where it was fiction on a technicality, was very 0:12:04.360 --> 0:12:07.679 thinly veiled fiction. It was real, but the names were 0:12:07.760 --> 0:12:13.160 changed to right barely um. And then there was Caroline 0:12:13.440 --> 0:12:16.120 and listed in Caroline were actually supposed to be married, 0:12:16.559 --> 0:12:19.520 but that ceremony was called off on the eve of 0:12:19.559 --> 0:12:23.679 the wedding because Caroline, who had been married previously, discovered 0:12:23.720 --> 0:12:27.320 that her first marriage was still legally standing, at least 0:12:27.400 --> 0:12:29.360 in the eyes of the church, which meant they could 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:35.280 not become with the next day. So enter Olga Olga 0:12:35.400 --> 0:12:39.640 Janina was a cigar smoking feminist, although if we're being 0:12:39.720 --> 0:12:42.800 period correct, which we should be, she was a proto feminist. 0:12:42.960 --> 0:12:45.360 This was the time when the ground worked for feminism 0:12:45.400 --> 0:12:48.920 as we know it today was just beginning to form. 0:12:48.920 --> 0:12:50.840 She stood out for a couple of reasons, but they're 0:12:50.880 --> 0:12:54.000 really just two big ones. Um. She preferred to wear 0:12:54.040 --> 0:12:57.000 a jacket and trousers at a time when women didn't 0:12:57.080 --> 0:13:01.880 wear trousers, and also for her bizarre behavior. Olga had 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:05.439 been notoriously unstable during the time in her life when 0:13:05.480 --> 0:13:09.120 she lived in Budapest and now living in Paris, the 0:13:09.120 --> 0:13:11.880 time that her life intersects would List, she had picked 0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:16.440 up a reputation for being we quote rowdy. She was 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:20.040 very jealous of other women, and she was very aggressive. 0:13:20.480 --> 0:13:23.559 So we actually have a good example of rowdy and aggressive. 0:13:23.800 --> 0:13:26.800 I think, Um, if we go a little bit deeper 0:13:26.840 --> 0:13:29.720 into the kind of person Olga was, if we take 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:32.600 away her passion for list and just talk about her, 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:36.800 this is a pretty telling example. So when an upcoming 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:39.959 recital of hers was not promoted in local papers or 0:13:40.080 --> 0:13:43.840 didn't receive the glowing reviews she had expected, she was 0:13:44.000 --> 0:13:46.480 not above taking matters into her own hands. And there's 0:13:46.520 --> 0:13:49.320 one anecdote that has her dressing as a man with 0:13:49.360 --> 0:13:52.840 a cane and visiting one of the newspaper editors who 0:13:53.240 --> 0:13:56.600 did not promote her, and she berated him while striking 0:13:56.679 --> 0:14:00.439 him in the face and chest with that cane. Aggressive 0:14:02.800 --> 0:14:05.440 I'm gonna take us down a little side street about 0:14:05.440 --> 0:14:08.960 her mode of dress because her clothing choices were actually 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:13.800 not entirely unprecedented at this time. So George Song, who 0:14:13.840 --> 0:14:16.360 we have name checked on this show before and who 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:18.800 was actually a very good friend of Lists. She was 0:14:18.880 --> 0:14:22.160 with Chopin for many years, so they had a friendship together. 0:14:22.960 --> 0:14:26.680 She famously wore men's were during this period, and this was, 0:14:26.800 --> 0:14:29.680 as we said, this sort of period of proto feminism, 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:34.760 and donning those garments was actually an act of protests 0:14:34.800 --> 0:14:38.560 because it was, if you can imagine, now, illegal in 0:14:38.640 --> 0:14:42.640 Paris for women to wear pants without a permit. Those 0:14:42.640 --> 0:14:46.160 permits were given to people whose jobs necessitated these so 0:14:46.280 --> 0:14:49.760 called unladylike garments, or to people who could offer up 0:14:49.840 --> 0:14:53.680 some health reason that they needed to wear them. Incidentally, 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:57.320 that law was on the books in Paris until so 0:14:57.400 --> 0:14:59.400 let's just let our minds be blown for a moment 0:14:59.400 --> 0:15:06.040 away pause. Paris Seat of Fashion where it was illegal 0:15:06.080 --> 0:15:10.040 to wear your jeans until technically, but the point here 0:15:10.120 --> 0:15:12.880 is that in walking down the street in pants to 0:15:13.000 --> 0:15:17.800 assault demand with a cane Olga, Janina was breaking multiple 0:15:17.920 --> 0:15:22.120 laws and she knew it that. Yeah, I think like, oh, 0:15:22.160 --> 0:15:27.440 I didn't know I wasn't allowed to wear pants, right. Um. 0:15:27.480 --> 0:15:30.840 So we mentioned earlier that she was also a pianist, 0:15:31.000 --> 0:15:34.320 and she became one of the students when she was 0:15:34.400 --> 0:15:39.480 about twenty four years old. But she set herself apart 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:43.000 from his other students though. She wasn't quiet about the 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:45.760 fact that she kept a revolver in her handbag, and 0:15:46.960 --> 0:15:49.040 the other students were, and I don't really blame them, 0:15:49.040 --> 0:15:51.240 they were kind of afraid of her when she showed 0:15:51.320 --> 0:15:57.000 up to class. Um. I mean I took piano lessons 0:15:57.280 --> 0:15:59.360 when I was younger, and if someone had showed up 0:15:59.400 --> 0:16:04.160 and said, hey, have you been practicing the sonata? By 0:16:04.160 --> 0:16:05.480 the way, I have a gun, I would be like, 0:16:06.920 --> 0:16:12.480 I'll play Hungarian Rhapsody faster. I'm sorry. But it wasn't 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:14.800 even just the revolver. It was believed that she also 0:16:14.880 --> 0:16:18.720 carried a dagger, and that's a dagger with a poisoned tip. 0:16:18.960 --> 0:16:22.480 Some sources also suggest that Olga wasn't opium users, So 0:16:22.520 --> 0:16:24.960 this is a whole combination of things that really are 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:28.520 wow um which actually the opium use wouldn't have been 0:16:28.560 --> 0:16:32.000 all that weird at the time. Um. She also carried 0:16:32.000 --> 0:16:34.760 around a small bag containing her stash of narcotics, and 0:16:34.800 --> 0:16:37.480 it said that there was also poisons in it. And 0:16:37.800 --> 0:16:39.920 for any of those who listened to the first season 0:16:40.000 --> 0:16:42.720 of Criminaliat, sorry but there's no word on whether or 0:16:42.720 --> 0:16:46.360 not that was arsenic in the bag. It's always about 0:16:46.760 --> 0:16:54.560 it's always arsenic. I'm assuming it was probably. Olga Janina 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:57.960 was also one of the women who swooned over List, 0:16:58.080 --> 0:17:01.400 and by swooned we mean threatened his in her own 0:17:01.440 --> 0:17:04.280 life over an affair that the pair actually had in 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:09.680 eighteen seventy. Olga just found herself madly infatuated with him 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:14.119 and consequently madly jealous. She followed the women that she 0:17:14.200 --> 0:17:17.600 considered to be her rivals for his affection, and then 0:17:17.680 --> 0:17:21.439 she just started following Lists. Um. So in the summer 0:17:21.440 --> 0:17:24.560 of eighteen seventy one, after their affair was over, List 0:17:24.800 --> 0:17:28.320 encouraged Olga to travel to New York to give piano performances, 0:17:28.359 --> 0:17:30.880 which I mean at the very least would give him 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:34.320 a break from her continuing emotional blackmail that had been 0:17:34.359 --> 0:17:37.639 going on. So Olga did go to New York, but 0:17:37.880 --> 0:17:40.359 once she arrives, their history kind of loses track of 0:17:40.400 --> 0:17:44.040 her story. And it's assumed that because List destroyed most 0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:46.760 of the letters that she sent him, that's why we 0:17:46.800 --> 0:17:50.040 don't really know. But we do know a little bit 0:17:50.080 --> 0:17:54.439 about their correspondence from some of Olga's own records and 0:17:54.480 --> 0:17:57.800 Maria's mentioning correspondence, because we know that she continued to 0:17:57.800 --> 0:18:02.280 send him letters. And in one letter, she we quote, 0:18:02.440 --> 0:18:05.840 begs for a few gentle words from her beloved, but 0:18:05.960 --> 0:18:09.800 she did not get them. Liz replied, not what she 0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:13.679 was hoping, and again we're quoting here. The violence of 0:18:13.720 --> 0:18:18.040 your feelings disturbs my peace of mind. Permit me therefore 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:21.160 to inform you that I shall decline to accept any 0:18:21.200 --> 0:18:24.200 more of your strange ravings, at least until such time 0:18:24.560 --> 0:18:27.640 that you understand that no one who fails to observe 0:18:27.680 --> 0:18:31.679 God's laws can ever hope to find happiness. You also 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:35.080 need to reconcile your fate, which is the product, moreover, 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:40.520 of your various acts of imprudence. So that's a pretty 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:47.120 serious burn Smarting from that, Olga plotted revenge on her 0:18:47.160 --> 0:18:50.160 once beloved List, and when she returned from New York 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:55.200 in late one, she threatened to kill him upon her arrival, 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:58.679 and she wasn't really shy about telling people what her 0:18:58.720 --> 0:19:01.520 plan was, and it was her wife's ambition was to 0:19:01.600 --> 0:19:05.480 kill List and then commit suicide. And a few sources 0:19:06.040 --> 0:19:09.879 do report that she did swallow poison, and when a 0:19:09.920 --> 0:19:12.080 doctor was called to help her, it turned out that 0:19:12.119 --> 0:19:19.560 she hadn't actually swallowed anything that was dangerous at all. Oh, 0:19:19.600 --> 0:19:21.960 we are going to take another quick break and have 0:19:22.040 --> 0:19:24.280 a word from a sponsor, and when we return, we're 0:19:24.320 --> 0:19:28.320 going to talk about Olga's books, and there will also 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:30.959 be a little mention of the who's Roger Daltery and 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:34.000 how he is connected to any of The story just 0:19:34.080 --> 0:19:49.720 keeps getting stranger and stranger. Welcome back to Criminalia. Let's 0:19:49.720 --> 0:19:51.560 now get into the kinds of things that were in 0:19:51.600 --> 0:19:56.520 Olga's memoirs. So to be clear, Olga and Liszt were 0:19:56.640 --> 0:20:01.200 never in a committed relationship. They're a fair lasted much 0:20:01.320 --> 0:20:04.240 less than a year, but it inspired her to write 0:20:04.240 --> 0:20:07.440 a lot more than just letters. She wrote her memoirs. 0:20:08.280 --> 0:20:10.919 In her first book, published in eighteen seventy four, was 0:20:10.960 --> 0:20:15.520 called Souvenir dun Kosak that translates to Memories of a Cossack. 0:20:15.880 --> 0:20:20.080 She wrote that under the pseudonym Robert Franz, Now there 0:20:20.280 --> 0:20:22.600 was a real Robert Franz at the time. He was 0:20:22.640 --> 0:20:25.720 a German composer, and he was one of Liszt's contemporaries. 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:28.280 So this had to have been a little bit awkward, 0:20:28.560 --> 0:20:31.240 and also how confusing would it have been for him 0:20:31.720 --> 0:20:34.199 to see his name listed as the author of a 0:20:34.320 --> 0:20:38.080 kiss and tell book about a barely fictionalized version of 0:20:38.080 --> 0:20:41.840 one of his friends. This book didn't make the splash 0:20:41.920 --> 0:20:44.800 that she had really hoped that it would, But the 0:20:44.840 --> 0:20:48.240 cover art actually sounds pretty great. Um, it was list, 0:20:48.440 --> 0:20:50.679 but it was a caricature of him playing the piano 0:20:50.800 --> 0:20:55.399 for half clothed cherubs who were scattering flower pedals at 0:20:55.400 --> 0:20:59.800 his feet and offering him wine. Upon reading lists. Good 0:20:59.800 --> 0:21:02.679 for End, whose name actually also was Olga, she was 0:21:02.800 --> 0:21:06.280 the Baroness von mayan Org wrote to him that she 0:21:06.440 --> 0:21:08.720 was now going to end have to quote this because 0:21:08.720 --> 0:21:10.600 her word was much better than anything that I would 0:21:10.600 --> 0:21:20.800 come up with disinfect her library. So Liszt actually himself 0:21:20.880 --> 0:21:23.720 when he wrote back, he didn't seem very upset by 0:21:23.760 --> 0:21:25.920 the book or any of this. But if you recall, 0:21:26.280 --> 0:21:32.240 this actually wasn't the first scandalous book starring him. He's 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:34.360 old hat at this. He's been through this before. It's 0:21:34.400 --> 0:21:38.760 like whatever in eighteen seventy four, in eighteen seventy five, 0:21:38.840 --> 0:21:41.960 so remember, let's just this up in years. At this point. 0:21:42.359 --> 0:21:46.240 Olga went on to write two more books called Leisamuel 0:21:46.359 --> 0:21:51.760 dun cossack X that's Loves of a Cossack by a 0:21:51.880 --> 0:21:55.959 Friend of the abbe X and Le Roman du Pianiste 0:21:56.119 --> 0:21:59.480 aid le Cossack that's the novel of the Pianist and 0:21:59.520 --> 0:22:02.080 the Cossack, which is very much a reference to him 0:22:02.160 --> 0:22:06.600 and her. Right, that's really not very well bailed, right, 0:22:06.720 --> 0:22:09.760 she she self identified as Cossack. That will come up 0:22:09.760 --> 0:22:13.399 again in a moment. So these books were ones that 0:22:13.520 --> 0:22:16.159 she also wrote under a pseudonym, but this time it 0:22:16.280 --> 0:22:19.560 was a different one. It was Sylvia Zarelli, and her 0:22:19.640 --> 0:22:24.479 books were widely regarded as defamatory. Everyone knew exactly who 0:22:24.600 --> 0:22:27.720 and what she was referencing, and they were also kind 0:22:27.760 --> 0:22:31.080 of relegated to being pulp fiction. But she seemed quite 0:22:31.119 --> 0:22:34.680 proud of it. She sent copies to all of Liszt's friends. Well, 0:22:34.720 --> 0:22:39.639 it's a nice gift to get. And despite her books 0:22:39.720 --> 0:22:44.160 being and I'm gonna do this quote end quote business autobiographical, 0:22:44.920 --> 0:22:48.399 it was about this time when Olga was outed for 0:22:48.480 --> 0:22:51.240 a few things, and these things did not include anything 0:22:51.280 --> 0:22:55.600 about List. So first, her last name was not Janina, 0:22:56.119 --> 0:22:59.760 it was Zelinska. And I'm not fluid in Polish, so up, 0:22:59.800 --> 0:23:03.160 my apologies to those of you who are. She had 0:23:03.280 --> 0:23:05.959 taken the name Dannina from her husband, whom she had 0:23:06.000 --> 0:23:09.600 abandoned along with her child because of her passion for List. 0:23:10.760 --> 0:23:12.639 And it also became known at this time that she 0:23:12.760 --> 0:23:15.520 was not a Cossack, nor was she a countess as 0:23:15.560 --> 0:23:18.320 she had been telling people. She was actually the daughter 0:23:18.400 --> 0:23:21.720 of a boot polish maker, and her life, as she 0:23:21.880 --> 0:23:24.560 told it, was truly a work of fiction that was 0:23:24.640 --> 0:23:29.119 probably the better work than those horrible novels. Historians are 0:23:29.160 --> 0:23:34.040 actually still untangling the reality of who Olga was and 0:23:34.119 --> 0:23:38.040 the life that she led, particularly after lists death, and 0:23:38.119 --> 0:23:41.000 in the end, with all sorts of damage done, it 0:23:41.080 --> 0:23:43.880 appears that she retreated and then went on to establish 0:23:43.960 --> 0:23:48.800 a piano studio in Geneva hopefully less aggressive, maybe without 0:23:48.880 --> 0:23:53.600 the revolver. I don't know, maybe her teaching style, right, 0:23:53.720 --> 0:23:59.480 she's really aggressive with her pupils list, so a list. Well. 0:24:00.280 --> 0:24:02.240 He walked away from everything as well, but in a 0:24:02.320 --> 0:24:06.399 different way. So around eighteen sixty one or maybe eighteen 0:24:06.440 --> 0:24:09.200 sixty three. The dates seemed to vary a bit, but 0:24:09.480 --> 0:24:12.240 those are the two that always pop up. He began 0:24:12.400 --> 0:24:15.200 living a more solitary life and he moved into a 0:24:15.320 --> 0:24:18.760 small apartment in a monastery just outside of Rome, and 0:24:19.080 --> 0:24:22.440 in July of eighteen sixty five he received the four 0:24:22.520 --> 0:24:25.840 Minor Orders of the Catholic Church, which when you receive these, 0:24:25.920 --> 0:24:29.359 they make you a low ranking clergyman. It did not 0:24:29.640 --> 0:24:33.040 make him a priest, but he had considered priesthood when 0:24:33.080 --> 0:24:37.000 he was a teenager. This career change was a huge 0:24:37.119 --> 0:24:39.679 surprise to many of his fans and to his peers, 0:24:40.080 --> 0:24:43.560 and apparently to the Catholic Church too. There's this great 0:24:43.640 --> 0:24:46.920 quote from a monk referring to him as Mephistopheles in 0:24:46.960 --> 0:24:50.200 the guise of clergy. This really was I think to 0:24:50.320 --> 0:24:56.560 contextualize it for modern comparison, right, like think of a 0:24:56.760 --> 0:24:59.399 rock star who was sort of known to be like 0:24:59.520 --> 0:25:02.280 think of Jagger going, hey, I decided to become a 0:25:02.359 --> 0:25:10.080 monk right when he released straight Yeah. Liz died on 0:25:10.200 --> 0:25:13.600 July six. He was seventy four at the time and 0:25:13.680 --> 0:25:16.879