A story about Róża, a musically talented girl, who – after an unsuccessful love affair – wasted an opportunity to make a career as a violin player.
This is also a story about alienation, difficulties with finding one’s place in life and the resulting embitterment and sense of wasted opportunities.
Róża is a daughter of a Pole working in Russia. Fascinated with the skills of an Italian violin player, she decides to follow in her footsteps and goes to Warsaw with her aunt, where she starts her musical education. Here she gets to know a music professor – Michał Bądski who becomes the first great love of her life. Together they go to Petersburg. Disappointed with Michał’s love affair, she comes back to Warsaw, where she marries Adam. This is a marriage of convenience. Frustrated, she begins to neglect her education, for which she blames her husband. Time goes by, yet Róża cannot overcome feeling disappointed by her first love. She becomes bitter, difficult to get on with and continuously unhappy. She devotes herself completely to raising her kids. Her daughter Marta has an incredible musical talent. She becomes a famous singer but Róża can no longer be happy about it. She’s sick and decides to evaluate her life objectively. She perceives herself as a nasty and despotic woman and identifies why she has become who she is. A final conversation with her husband and daughter is a great relief for Róża. She dies reconciled with her loved ones and, what’s most important, with herself.
