Les Parisiennes: How the Women of Paris Lived, Loved, and Died Under Nazi Occupation

Product Information

Despite never having had the vote or even legally allowed to have a banking account, growing numbers contributed in small or moderate ways to helping Jews escape or hide or providing information or material support to aid those active in the Resistance. I like the example of brothel madams who hid subversives or Jews in their establishments. And the case of Edith Piaf, who drew complaints for aiding the Nazi propaganda efforts with performances at detention centers, but who used the group photos with the prisoners to create fake identity papers for many of them. I particularly loved the actions of an art archiver who was subverted by the Nazis to help with all the cataloging and distribution of stolen art treasures (Goering himself was long on the trough of that bonanza), but all the while she was keeping a secret record of the origin and disposition of each piece, and after the war used her records to good effect in recovering a lot of the art. I was also impressed with the heroism of Jenny Rousseau, a prisoner who one day refused to continue with forced labor in a munitions plant as against the Geneva Convention. The toughness of a such a choice at risk of one’s own life was revealed when we learn that the action spurred broad and brutal retribution against a whole pool of factory laborers. A similar tragic consequence applied to the work of the organization UGIF (Union Generale des Israelites de France) , which worked diligently to support the feeding and housing of orphans and refugees, but had their records of locations of Jews used for roundups by the Nazis. And perhaps the answer is as simple as that – which is why, in the end, Sebba doesn’t offer an explanation as to why some women chose one course, others another, rightly letting their actions, compelling life stories – and the physiognomy of the wonderful selection of photographs – speak for themselves. Les Parisiennes: How the Women of Paris Lived, Loved and Died in the 1940s . Anne Sebba. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. 2016.

As long as one could tolerate the laying off of most Jews in the diverse businesses, accommodation was acceptable by the majority and the law of the land under the puppet Vichy government. The women with the most anti-fascist rebellion in their hearts, those with communist leanings, were undercut by the German-Russian pact of 1940. But when the Vichy government went out of their way to pass anti-semitic laws and turn a blind eye to factories being manned with the slave labor of political prisoners and POWs, more recruits to Resistance activity were made. Just seeing fashion queens like Coco Chanel, actresses like Corrine Lachaire, and diverse aristocrat courtesans hobnobbing in luxurious splendor with German officers at the Folies Bergere, the Comedie-Francaise, the opera, and fancy restaurants was enough to turn the heart of many of lesser means at a hungry time. Sleeping with the enemy was one step, but doing so with such special benefits was a big affront, though still not enough to sway many toward revolt. Besides, the eventual policy of the Nazis to kill 100 French for every German killed by the Resistance was quite a deterrent. Jennie Churchill: Winston's American Mother was reviewed, inter alia, in The Independent, [14] The Daily Telegraph, [15] and The Scotsman, [16] A wide range and sweeping view of the many different women, many well known, who were in Paris immediately before, during and after the Nazi occupation. Your enjoyment of this will depend on what you as the reader expect to get out of this book. It is certainly well researched, in fact the last 20% of the book is footnotes and sources. I found the huge amount of information as well as the large cast of people to be confusing and frustrating. Different people do sometimes overlap but often many chapters later. At the same time, those Parisians who lived for the city’s glamour and style insisted the show must go on – telling themselves perhaps that maintaining a way of life was itself a form of resistance, even though they knew full well that they could only party at the Germans’ behest.In 2009, Sebba wrote and presented The Daffodil Maiden on BBC Radio 3. It was an account of the pianist Harriet Cohen, who inspired the composer Arnold Bax when she wore a dress adorned with a single daffodil and became his mistress for the next 40 years. [6] In 2010, she wrote and presented the documentary Who was Joyce Hatto? for BBC Radio 4. Her discovery of an unpublished series of letters from Wallis Simpson to her second husband Ernest Simpson, shortly before her eventual marriage to the former King, Edward VIII, later the Duke of Windsor, formed the basis of a Channel 4 documentary, The Secret Letters, [2] first shown on UK television in August 2011, and also a biography of Simpson, That Woman: The Life of Wallis Simpson Duchess of Windsor. It begins in 1939 when the City becomes aware of the German threat but during the lull when the Germans are gracious and cultured and polite. Soon things begin to change and the food shortages begin and Jews are rounded up and made to wear yellow stars, Jewish companies are aranized and their owners flee or to into hiding. Many French men have already gone to unoccupied France to fight in DeGualle's army, what few are left are gathered up and sent to work in Germany for the war effort. Left behind are the women and children, whom they need to protect and feed. The choices made by the women are unbelieveable--some resist, some depart and others collaborate--some even collaborate while also resisting. All of the stories are heart-breaking and over and over I asked myself, what would I do, would I be able to survive some of the horrors , how would I protect my child? The Monday Book". The Independent. 1 October 2007. Archived from the original on 2 November 2012 . Retrieved 26 September 2009.

June, 1940. German troops enter Paris and hoist the swastika over the Arc de Triomphe. The dark days of Occupation begin. How would you have survived? By collaborating with the Nazis, or risking the lives of you and your loved ones to resist?

Delivery

Ethel Rosenberg by Anne Sebba review – a mother murdered by cold war hysteria". the Guardian. 27 June 2021 . Retrieved 28 June 2021. If you would like to discuss “Les Parisiennes” at your Reading Group here are some suggested areas for discussion. What Sebba brings to the the story is an interest in what this meant for women: in 1940 when Paris fell to the Nazis, women had no vote, were not allowed to have bank accounts, were not supposed to have jobs, yet with most of the men either in the army or in prison or escaped overseas with de Gaulle's Free French, much of the burden of everyday living, of caring for children and the elderly, fell to women: 'Paris became a significantly feminized city, and the women had to negotiate on a daily basis with the male occupier'.

What would you do in this situation? It is easy with hindsight to condemn, but put into this life would you be brave enough to resist? Or would you, like millions did, find a way to live alongside the occupiers? So, we go through 1940, when Paris was abandoned as many took a desperate, terrifying flight across France. However, when the German army arrived, they were often well-dressed, amiable and polite – at least at first and to most of the city’s inhabitants… People began to return, but gradually resistance groups emerged. There are arrests, denunciations, betrayal, fear, solidarity and every possible emotion through the war years. Always there is danger and hunger, but still Parisian women remade their dresses, put wooden soles on their shoes and pounced on parachute silk to make clothes. Aside from a few show trials, few collaborators were really punished after the war. Most of these were convicted under a new law which stripped their citizenship rights and eligibility for government jobs for a period of time. De Gaulle judged that the country needed to concentrate on recovery and did not pursue close investigations. Also, it was hard to judge people criminally for aiding the Nazis when collaboration was the national policy of the Vichy government. But throughout every community, the French made their own retributions against the women seen as guilty of “collaboration horizontale”. An estimated 20,000 women were subject to public head shaving, beatings, and other humiliation. Another estimate has it that by mid-1943, there were about 80,000 official claims for support from French women for children fathered by Germans in the occupation. The author urges readers to consider how many of these liaisons were rape or under duress, how many were from natural human attraction and affection, and how all pale in comparison to collaboration that truly aided and abetted Nazi horrors or served unwarranted profiteering at the expense of others. Whilst the war offered women more freedom in terms of employment opportunities, their personal freedoms were still largely controlled by the fascist state who were attempting to follow Nazi Germany’s Kinder, Küche, Kirche (‘Children, Kitchen, Church’) doctrine. In ‘1943: Paris Trembles’, the author describes how on 30 July 1943 a woman named Marie-Louise Giraud was guillotined by the Vichy administration for the ‘crime’ of performing abortions. Marie-Louise holds the dubious accolade of being the only person in French history to be executed for such a reason. However, abortions were available to the rich for around 4,000 francs, but not always performed in the best interests of women: Arlette Scali described how her husband ‘did not want children […] when I was pregnant, my mother-in-law paid for abortions which were illegal and costly. It was horrible.’ Women who attempted to take control over their own lives and bodies in times of increasing uncertainty were antithetical to the administration’s attempt to fall in line with the ideology of their German occupiers, yet women’s bodies could be consumed by those rich enough to afford it as the Vichy government had legalised prostitution. Giraud was a victim of a regime that was rapidly falling out of touch with French society at large, argues the author, and represents the culture of denunciation that prevailed during occupation, of which there were around 3.5 million in France during the war.Lewis, Roger (2 September 2011). "That Woman: The Life of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor by Anne Sebba". Daily Telegraph. London.