The French writer and feminist George Sand came to Mallorca with her two children and her lover, Frederic Chopin, in December 1838. At first they lived in Palma, but the two houses they had were unsuitable to the winter-cold climate and they found refuge in a former monastery in Valldemossa, a village only about a dozen miles northwest of Palma, though in the 1830s it was a much longer 12 miles than it was on the rainy December day we drove there.
Wandering through the monastery's many cells was surreal. We were outside the regular tourist season and usually succeeded in avoiding the one busload of tourists simply by removing ourselves to a different room: the chemist's cell (apothecary), the two library rooms, or the several cells that may have been the homes of the couple, her children, and their servants. There are two pianos reportedly used by Chopin during his visit, the one that was transported from his home to the island (though delayed for a long time in customs) and the one he borrowed in Palma in the meantime.
Sand wrote in A Winter in Mallorca of the lovely natural scenery in Mallorca--and of the unpleasant people! No doubt the native Mallorquins were afraid of catching Chopin's tuberculosis and also were disgruntled that the couple never appeared at church, even on Sundays.
On a misty day and with free range to wander through the rooms and gardens at the monastery, and away from the hustle and bustle of other tourists, it was easy to imagine the couple in this place, and how nature and relative isolation could apparently give Chopin some peace to compose so much lovely music in the barely three months he spent here.
