Suite française

by Irène Némirovsky

Beginning in Paris on the eve of the Nazi occupation in 1940. Suite Française tells the remarkable story of men and women thrown together in circumstances beyond their control. As Parisians flee the city, human folly surfaces in every imaginable way: a wealthy mother searches for sweets in a town without food; a couple is terrified at the thought of losing their jobs, even as their world begins to fall apart. Moving on to a provincial village now occupied by German soldiers, the locals must learn to coexist with the enemy—in their town, their homes, even in their hearts.

When Irène Némirovsky began working on Suite Française, she was already a highly successful writer living in Paris. But she was also a Jew, and in 1942 she was arrested and deported to Auschwitz, where she died. For sixty-four years, this novel remained hidden and unknown.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, France, Book Club, World War II, War, Classics

497 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 1, 2004

About the author

Irène Némirovsky was born in Kyiv in 1903 into a successful banking family. Trapped in Moscow by the Russian Revolution, she and her family fled first to a village in Finland, and eventually to France, where she attended the Sorbonne.

Irène Némirovsky achieved early success as a writer: her first novel, David Golder, published when she was twenty-six, was a sensation. By 1937 she had published nine further books and David Golder had been made into a film; she and her husband Michel Epstein, a bank executive, moved in fashionable social circles.

When the Germans occupied France in 1940, she moved with her husband and two small daughters, aged 5 and 13, from Paris to the comparative safety of Issy-L’Evêque. It was there that she secretly began writing Suite Française. Though her family had converted to Catholicism, she was arrested on 13 July, 1942, and interned in the concentration camp at Pithiviers. She died in Auschwitz in August of that year. --Penguin Random House

Reviews

[Lucy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A masterpiece. And this is the rough draft.

I've spent the last day trying to decide if I loved this book because I'm sentimental. The author, Irene Nemirovsky, was a Russian Jew who wrote this while living in occupied France. A respected author, she had married Micheal Epstein who had also fled Russia when the Bolsheviks revolted. They had sincerely adopted France as their home country, converted to Catholicism and were the parents of two daughters. She began writing this novel while simultaneously experiencing it. She and her family had lived in Paris but had fled when German troops invaded the city. While most of the country was occupied, she moved to a French village and tried to survive amidst the new harsh laws concerning anyone of Jewish decent. She could no longer publish her works, could not cash checks, could not travel freely. Her life and freedom, as well as those of her husband and daughters were threatened daily. She had every excuse to be as frightened and as hysteric as anyone.

Yet, she managed to write an unbelievably candid look at Frenchmen in their hour of need. Her intention was to write a five part novella in the idea of a musical symphony much like Beethoven's Fifth examining the behavior of people from different classes of society. She succeeded in writing two of the five parts: Storm in June and Dolce. Storm in June begins as rumors of a German invasion into Paris reach a frenzied level and characters decide whether or not evacuate their homes. The attitude, priorities and expectations vary greatly between the elite and working class. Desperation brings out the very worst in most, but not all. Food, gas, shelter - the basic needs of any person, become scarce and the desire to survive seems to super cede any desire to help a neighbor. Nemirovsky is an expert at exposing this without focusing on the misery. Instead, in her own words, she shows "the prosperity that contrasts with it. . . one word for misery, ten for egotism, cowardice, closing ranks, crime. But it's true that it's this very atmosphere I'm breathing. It is easy to imagine it: the obsession with food." Writing about the contrast is very effective. `What impresses me more is that Nemirovsky was part of this aristocrat class. She was privileged. To have the ability to understand at all the confusion and need of those without shows great compassion, I think.

The second part of the novel, Dolce, is quite different. Rather than following several loosely related characters, she focuses on a small village adjusting to life with the German troop based there. Most of the upper class members of the village, farmers, land owners etc., had to house the officers of the German army at the same time their husbands, sons, and brothers were being held as prisoners of war someplace else. Nemirovsky manages to weave in a few of the characters from Storm into the story but the overall pace and feeling is much slower and calmer (ah....dolce!) The slower tempo and close proximity force many of the French to look at the Germans as humans rather than simply soldiers. Boredom resulting from the restrictions placed on the villagers, jealousy and greed as supplies and food are scarce for many cause tensions to run high. The most interesting part of this story to me was the relationship between Lucille and the German officer staying at their chateau all the while under the persecution of an unforgiving and pompous mother-in-law. How disappointing when this story ended and there was no more.

Following the two stories are the handwritten notes written by the author. Plans for the third part to be titled "Captivity" were outlined and different story lines attempted. The realization that this was all a rough draft boggles my mind. They seem so....done and flawless. What a loss. After the appendix showing Nemirovsky's plans for the novel is another with the letters recovered from her and her family, acquaintances, editors etc. during this time period. The tone in these letters is so different from the tone in her notes for the novel. It's as if she was somehow push away her fear and trepidation while writing and thinking. Her personal correspondence, however, reveals that she was very aware of the danger facing her. Her last letter is written to her husband as she is being taken to a concentration camp. Following letters show the desperation of her husband, trying to find out where she has been taken and how she can be saved. then those stop as he is arrested and also taken to a concentration camp. They were both killed at Auschwitz.

Her daughters were hid by a close friend for years until the war was over. Her eldest daughter carried around this manuscript in a suitcase wherever they traveled as a link to her mother and finally had it published and translated sixty years later.

I don't think I loved this just because I am sentimental although I love it for that very reason. Independent of the author's tragic parallel story is the creation of something unique and special. It is as if someone was holding a mirror up to the French during the war but this mirror is alluring and beautiful, so much so that you can't help but pick it up and just gaze. But it's more than just a look at the French people during a specific period of time. It is also a timeless portrait of humanity. Highly, highly recommended.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unless you’re reading a memoir or autobiography, you usually aren’t conscious of an author’s presence in a book. I’m not talking about style. Obviously, there are times you can tell the provenance of a book, and know its creator, by skimming a few paragraphs. Short, punchy sentences, hyper-masculinity, and casual misogyny mean I’m reading Hemingway; if I can’t understand what I’m reading, it’s because I’m trying Faulkner; and if I’ve fallen asleep, I know I’ve got something by Melville in my hands.

Beyond stylistic fingerprints, though, it’s rare that you are actually thinking about an author as you read. Usually, the author remains on the back flap as an airbrushed photograph and a short paragraph about a pet dog named Ulysses and a condo in New York.

Irène Némirovsky’s Suite Francaise is different. Her life – and her death – haunt every single page, making an entirely objective literary critique (if such a thing even exists) next to impossible. Némirovsky was a successful writer living in Paris when the Germans invaded France in 1940. The French, despite preparing for a German attack since 1918, quickly fell apart. The Germans advanced through the Ardennes, outflanked the Maginot Line, and perhaps took advantage of a shaky French psyche, which had suffered four years of occupation during World War I, and spent the intervening decades in fear of the Teutonic forces on their frontier.

In any event, France soon capitulated. Némirovsky was a convert to Roman Catholicism. However, under German racial laws, she was Jewish. She moved to the countryside where she began the truncated work today known as Suite Francaise. Némirovsky actually planned a total of five novels, designed to mirror a musical suite, which would total approximately 1,000 pages. She churned out drafts of the first two novels, Storm in June and Dolce, and had outlined a third novel, Captivity, before her arrest in 1942. Némirovsky was taken to Auschwitz, where she died. Fifty years later, her novels came to light.

With that as its background, Suite Francaise deflects any attempts at normal literary judgment. This is not a work of fiction in which the author had the ability to plan, plot and polish a finished novel; rather, the two “completed” books, essentially unrevised, are parts of an unfinished whole. Moreover, they were written under desperate circumstances about those same desperate circumstances. Even as you read about the mortal danger facing Némirovsky’s characters, you are forced to recall the noose tightening around her own neck.

Had it been finished, Suite Francaise would have provided an epic look at France under the Nazi boot-heel. As it exists, it is a fleeting, tantalizing glimpse at a marvelous talent.

Storm in June, the first book, is the more refined, vibrant, and fulfilling of the two completed sections of Suite Francaise. The story involves four separate groups of characters, forced to flee Paris ahead of the oncoming German Army. Though Némirovsky has drawn some connections among these four groups (and more connections likely would’ve been fleshed out), they mainly travel their separate roads.

The first group of characters are the Michaud’s. Maurice and Jeanne Michaud are smalltime employees at a bank run by the unlikeable Monsieur Corbin. The Michaud’s son, Jean-Marie, is a soldier in the French Army. The Michaud’s, being of modest means, are unable to leave Paris; they spend most of the story worrying about their son. Némirovsky’s characters are separated by class: the higher the class, the lower the character. As such, the Michaud’s are clearly Némirovsky’s favorites: noble and humble and good. However, due to those simplified traits, they are also the least interesting storyline.

The next character group is the Péricand family. The Péricand’s are of a higher social class, and they attempt to leave Paris for Nimes, where they own property. Though they have money, they also have a social conscious. One of the Péricand children, Philippe, is a priest in charge of the wellbeing of a party of orphans (unfortunately for Philippe, the orphans are straight out of The Lord of the Flies). Another of the Péricand brood, young Hubert, deserts his family on the road to join the army, where he inevitably learns that war is hell, there is no glory, etc., etc.

The final two storylines belong to Gabriel Corte, a famous writer, and Charles Langelet, a rich old collector of porcelain. Corte heads to Vichy with his mistress, while Langelet makes for Loire. These two are of the upper crust of French society, and Némirovsky clearly despises them. Indeed, Suite Francaise is laced with her elegantly controlled sense of outrage and betrayal. Némirovsky believed that France had forsaken her, and she clearly uses Suite Francaise to lay blame.

Yet despite the poison she heaps onto them, Corte and Langelet are fascinating protagonists. They are not heroic or good in any sense; but still, they are human, and in their moment-by-moment rationalizations, never achieve villainy. (However, there is a scene when Corte reaches the Grand Hotel at the end of his journey that approached mustache-twirling meanness. In this scene, Corte drinks from a chilled glass and eats a dish of olives and observes a gathering of his social peers who, like him, have escaped the dirty lower classes on the crowded roads from Paris. This passage ends with Corte and a playwright discussing their work, “without a thought for the rest of the world”).

Even Némirovsky, in her notes, realized that parts of Storm in June were overly melodramatic. (She picked out a scene with Philippe and the orphans for possible rewriting). There was also an instance where Némirovsky’s dislike for a certain character spilled over into a macabre death that felt more appropriate in a Final Destination movie.

Still, the cross-cutting between characters, highlighting the differences in class and personality, made for a satisfying story. Némirovsky also achieves a beautiful, vivid sense of the turnover from peace to war:

Day was breaking. A silvery blue light slid over the cobblestones, over the parapets along the quayside, over the towers of Notre-Dame. Bags of sand were piled halfway up all the important monuments, encircling Carpeaux’s dancers on the façade of the Opera House, silencing the Marseillaise on the Arc de Triomphe… [A]t some distance, great guns were firing; they drew nearer, and every window shuddered in reply. In hot rooms with blacked-out windows, children were born, and their cries made the women forget the sound of sirens and war. To the dying, the barrage of gunfire seemed far away, without any meaning whatsoever, just one more element in that vague, menacing whisper that washes over those on the brink of death. Children slept peacefully, held tight against their mothers’ sides, their lips making sucking noises, like little lambs. Street sellers’ carts lay abandoned, full of fresh flowers.

Dolce does not come near to matching the craft of Storm in June. It takes place in the village of Bussy, which has been occupied by the Germans. The main characters in Dolce are two women, Lucille and Madeleine. Lucille is married to a French prisoner-of-war. Before the surrender, her husband had been a cruel, philandering man, and Lucille does not quite mourn his absence. This fact is noted by her mother-in-law, who lives with Lucille. Madeleine is also in an unhappy marriage. Her husband is the simple farmer Benoit, a soldier who escaped German captivity and hungers to resist the invaders.

The tie binding Lucille and Madeleine, other than friendship, is their odd preoccupation with the German occupants of their respective homes. Both women are indifferent towards their French husbands; and both women harbor a secret lust for the gray-uniformed Aryan soldier living with them.

Certainly this is a bit transgressive. And maybe, with some work, there might have been a story here. But nothing really comes of this. Two-thirds of Dolce is exhaustingly repetitive, and is spent mostly with Lucille nurturing a no-touch flirtation with Bruno von Falk, her uninvited German guest. Only at the end of Dolce is there is hint of action, when Benoit kills a soldier and goes into hiding. This event, however, is framed as a sideshow to Lucille’s uncertain attraction to Bruno. Thus, an event that could have been milked for drama, remains limp and inert. Indeed, the whole of the German occupation seems relatively benign. The Germans may threaten to shoot people, but they never do. The stakes in Dolce are low, and remain low, until the Germans pack up and leave.

(While I did not quite enjoy Dolce, I did find it amazing that Némirovsky could conjure such humanity for her German characters. They are not monsters, just vaguely menacing foreigners who were often harmless, polite, and lovers of good music. Most of Némirovsky’s scorn is reserved for her own people).

The power of Suite Francaise comes as much from its circumstances as its content. I couldn’t read a single sentence without imagining Némirovsky writing that sentence while waiting for black-coated, jackboot-wearing thugs to knock on her door. In the appendix to this edition to Suite Francaise, you can see some of the original pages to her manuscript, the notes she wrote to herself, and letters she wrote to others. It shows an author of great talent and ambition, growing increasingly worried about her fate, turning to her writing as a kind of catharsis.

Fifty million people died in World War II. Approximately 6 million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. Of that number, some 77,000 came from France. Némirovsky was one of those 77,000. It is hard for me to imagine 77,000 of anything, much less 6 million or 50 million. The size of the numbers anesthetize the mind. In order to recognize a tragedy, you have to look to the individual. In that sense, the partly-completed Suite Francaise is a poignant symbol of human catastrophe of World War II. Its unfinished pages reflect somberly on an unfinished life.

[Jim Fonseca · Rating 5 out of 5]

[Revised, spoilers hidden, pictures added 12/11/22]

This is a story of the invasion of Paris by the Germans in WW II (Part I) and the German occupation of a village outside of Paris (Part II).



The main theme is that war brings out the best and worst in people. During the chaotic flight out of Paris, we see examples of great generosity and sharing but we also see people stealing food and gasoline from each other. The author follows the escapades of a variety of people from a cross-section of classes. But she saves her vitriol, spoken through her characters, for the upper classes and intellectuals. A playwright, a banker and an antiques dealer provide some of the worst examples of selfish behavior. But the lower classes aren’t off the hook. For example, a group of orphan boys kills a priest who was trying to help them.

Most of those residents who fled simply returned to Paris a week or two later. Throughout the book, the ghosts of the prior French-German wars in 1914 and in the 1870s come up so much they are like a character in the novel.

In Part II, set in a German-occupied village south of Paris, the class focus continues but shifts to peasants and landowners. German officers are quartered in people’s homes and again we have the full gamut of human behaviors. These range from some French who won’t even speak to a German to a French woman who falls in love with a German officer. even though her husband is a German POW.

The book is strangely silent about the impact of the war on Jews in France. I say strangely because the author (1903-1942) and her husband were of Jewish ancestry. Both were imprisoned and died in concentration camps even though they had converted to Catholicism. Their two daughters escaped and one had this novel in her suitcase.



In an Appendix are heart-breaking letters from the author writing to bankers and lawyers trying to get her confiscated funds freed up to support her family. There are also letters from her husband to lawyers and diplomats trying to learn the whereabouts of Nemirovsky who was imprisoned first.

I think Nemirovsky is a great author and I’ve read five of her novels. Suite Francaise is my favorite and it’s her most popular book by far on GR.

Photo of residents fleeing Paris in June 1940 from cartermuseum.org
The author from Wikipedia

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tour de force!

What a breathtaking achievement - this novel is incredible! The story of how it was written is a dramatic witness account of the surreal world of France occupied by the Wehrmacht from 1940 on. Irène Némirovsky, of Jewish origin, wrote it while expecting to be deported to the East, and she had barely finished it when she was arrested in July 1942. She was murdered in Auschwitz, but her children survived, hidden until the end of the war. And with them, moving from one hiding place to the next, they brought this manuscript. That alone makes it a special document, and I started reading it mainly because the circumstances of its creation fascinated me - in a heartbreaking way.

The novel itself is of unique brilliance, of acute observation, a prelude to the darkest hours in the Second World War, a study of humanity living through a universal stress test, not knowing that the worst is still ahead.

A diverse collection of characters from different walks of life are thrown into uncertainty and confusion when Germany invades France. In a hectic crowd they leave Paris to escape, only to find themselves in various difficult situations as the long trail of refugees fill up the small villages and towns in the countryside. Depending on social status and personality, they all see the occupation from their own specific perspective, and Némirovsky paints human weakness and vanity in tragicomical truthfulness. When a woman complains about all stores being empty, and nothing left for them to purchase, her husband laughs and says he has found a store fully equipped.

-A piano shop!

But underneath their fatalistic sense of humour, the fleeing people learn that the Christian charity they had adapted in better times doesn't count much when they feel existentially threatened: "Il lui fallait nourrir et abriter ses petits. Le reste ne comptait plus."

As time goes by, the French arrange themselves around the dominance of the German soldiers. They get used to the signs forbidding everything - "a peine de mort", they get used to the forced accommodation of soldiers in their homes, to the secrecy and danger of speaking their minds, to anxiously waiting for sons and husbands to come back. They get used to the presence of the occupying force, and even start seeing some of the soldiers as human beings.

There are dilemmas and complications as young soldiers and women fall in love on an individual level but reject each other as members of different community systems:

"Je hais cet esprit communautaire dont on nous rebat les oreilles. Les Allemands, les Francais, les gaullistes s'entendent tous sur un point: il faut vivre, penser, aimer avec les autres, en fonction d'un État, d'un pays, d'un parti. Oh mon Dieu! je ne veux pas. Je suis une pauvre femme inutile; je ne sais rien mais je veux être libre!"

In the end, the forces of their communities are stronger than individual feelings, however, and the characters are all driven by the maelstrom of war to commit to the dogma of their unit of power.

The novel ends with the departure of the German soldiers who are ordered to move to the Eastern front, and their life in France seems almost idyllic with hindsight, knowing what awaits them. So the war moves to the East, and one of its victims is the author of this unbelievable, yet incredibly realistic account of France under the yoke of German occupation.

Must-Read!

[Lord Beardsley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book jolted me. It's rare when I read a book literally from cover to cover...and close it nearly in tears. This was witten as France was being occupied by the Nazis during the Second World War, thus, this may well be the first fictional account of World War Two as it was happening. Needless to say, this is an immensely important book and in my opinion should be required reading in history classes. This is an unfinished work by a Russian-French author who died in Auschwitz before she could complete what she was hoping would be a novel-opus written in the style of a piece of music. This is definately an ambitious and frustrating read. But the readers must take in mind that this is an incomplete draft. As a writer, I enjoyed reading something unfinished. It was wonderful to be able to crawl into someone's imaginative workings as they are happening with all the frayed bits left strung out. It helped me in assessing my own approach to the creative process and I think I'll be referring back to this novel time and again to get some pointers on plot devices and flow.

As a story, this is flawed. If I was just giving points for the story itself I would only alot it three stars. The fourth is for the fact that the appendix's in the back as well as the forword to the French addition are utterly fascinating. This is a highly forgotten author and I'm looking forward to reading more of her work. It pains me that this was never completed.

*On a side note, I experienced a strange realization while reading this by finding out that the suburb of Paris where my girlfriend's grandmother lives, Drancy, is the site of a former concentration camp.*

This gives a fascinatingly detailed account of life during the French Occupation as it was happening through the eyes of a formerly (but that has never been known to stop Nazis) Jewish woman. She has a keen knack for expressing the human experience. The lives of those she describes are lives interrupted during war, whether it be French peasants or young, highly incompetent German soldiers in way over their heads. She described the young German soldiers with a tenderness and empathy I thought incredible. Thus, subverting their "power" by describing them as young boys caught up in something they have marginal understanding of. The most poignant scenes for me where those in which she described what happens to young people during wartime. How all the young French boys are away and the young girls secretly idolize their captors and their captors in turn court the young girls...after all they're still teenagers. That to me, was heart-breaking. Reading this, over sixty years after it was written and in another pseudo "war", makes me realize how useless the power displays of men playing king of the hill really are...especially when the lives of everyday people are involved.

[Fabian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this one up because it resembled a historical romance. (I believe the cover to be one of the most powerful and beautiful, & just o-so-right for this particular book that I could scream!) Then I found out what the tiny particles of pathos all seemed to portend: this was a posthumous work. Immediately the work becomes grounded--it easily turns into something more important, more adult, even more delicate. This is an incredible novel which may've easily been lost forever...! Yikes!!

Perhaps the writer's tragic background story is sadder than this-- an unequal/unfinished take on the early years of the second World War in France. It is divided into two separate parts: "Storm in June" relates the mass exodus by those many different individuals leaving Paris--the puppetry of all the characters is what's so terrific in the novel (Miss Nemirovsky can pick out different people from different classes with such ease and art... like a stroll through the decks of the Titanic). But the second part, which DOES relate a romance between a Frenchwoman and (gasp!) a German soldier, makes the whole really, truly uneven (entitled "Dolce," that second part was often found to be more "Dull-ce"). Although I was truly stirred by the descriptions of the hot German soldier looking all masculine while still retaining the monster within, I kept asking myself: What happened to all the characters from the first part? That their fates were blurred away makes so much sense in a historical, even aesthetic, way. In all reality, many lives, like that of the writer herself, who died in a concentration camp a year or two later, were erased forever... just like that, many stories were left sadly unfinished.

It would've been a grand treat to have read all of Irene Nemirovsky's proposed magnum opus (a gargantuan of more than 1000 pages!). Just because both parts do not mesh completely doesn't indicate that the book is not overfilled with symbols & thoughts of forewarning, sadness & doom.

[Helga چـو ایـران نباشد تن من مـباد · Rating 5 out of 5]

Misery and misfortune, misery and misfortune!...

You could smell the suffering in the air, in the silence.

Suite Française consists of two books “Storm in June” and “Dolce” both of which originally were supposed to be a part of 5 novels which were never written due to the author’s arrest and later her death at Auschwitz.
The handwritten manuscripts were hidden in a suitcase and later saved by the author's daughters.

To lift such a heavy weight Sisyphus, you will need all your courage. I do not lack the courage to complete the task. But the end is far and time is short.

In Suite Française, the author acquaints us with complex characters. Some good and kind, some selfish and arrogant. It is them that we follow in this tragedy; in the midst of the exodus and under enemy occupation, as they face difficult challenges and make perilous decisions.
Some characters we will love, some we will hate, but none we can judge.

Even so, we have to make it through . . . we have to get away, from this blood, from this mud dragging us down . . . We’re not just going to lie down and die . . . Are we, well, are we? That would be too ridiculous. We have to hang on . . . hang on . . . hang on…

“Who could we speak to?” Jeanne finally exclaimed.
“You mean you still don’t understand that nobody cares about anybody?”
She looked at him. “You’re strange, Maurice. You’ve seen people at their most cynical, their most disillusioned, and at the same time you’re not unhappy, I mean, not really unhappy inside! Am I wrong?”
“No.”
“So what makes it all right, then?”
“My certainty that deep down I’m a free man,” he said, after thinking for a moment. “It’s a constant, precious possession, and whether I keep it or lose it is up to me and no one else. I desperately want the insanity we’re living through to end. I desperately want what has begun to finish. In a word, I desperately want this tragedy to be over and for us to try to survive it, that’s all. What’s important is to live: Primum vivere. One day at a time. To survive, to wait, to hope.”

[Tea Jovanović · Rating 5 out of 5]

MUST READ! MUST READ! Wonderful unfinished novel by famous Jewish French author... Interesting story is behind publication of this novel... The manuscript stayed in a box for decades because the daughters of the author thought it is diary... but it was not... One of my favourite novels and I am proud that I was its Serbian editor... :)

U Srbiji je knjigu objavila Laguna... predivna knjiga... veoma dirljiva...

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

The story of the author and how the book came to be published so many years after her death is a much more compelling story than this, although if Nemirovsky had the chance to complete the book to her vision I may think differently. As it is, the book was well-done in its portrayal of the many facets of human nature that show themselves in times of crises. Nemirovsky shows a sympathy for basic human responses, even if those reactions are abhorrent to common values and sentiments.

The book also portrayed a part of history, the German invasion and occupation of France, that I didn't know much about besides the hard facts - how people fled Paris only to be killed on the roads and villages by German bombs, the guilt of French people who chose to collaborate with the Germans in order to survive. Suprisingly, she did not discuss the experiences of Jews in France and the deeper fear they must have felt upon the German invasion, but perhaps that was for a later part of the book she didn't finish before being sent to a concentration camp herself.

Still, even though I did enjoy the book, I did not find it engrossing in a way that kept me reading. I think this is because of a lack of plot. Each chapter was like a self-contained episode in the lives of certain characters. And while those episodes were interesting and entertaining, perhaps even meaningful, there was no drive to keep reading. The second half of the book, the Dolce volume, had more of a storyline that continued from chapter to chapter and had more of a pull. But I still can't say that it deserved a three-star review. Maybe two-and-a-half.

[Ana Cristina Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

La historia de esta gran obra inconclusa rescatada de una maleta, así como la muerte de su autora en Auschwitz por su condición de judía son bien conocidas y por sí solas darían interés a este documento histórico sobre la ocupación alemana en Francia, escrita en el momento de los hechos. Pero es que además es una gran novela, no en vano Némirovski menciona repetidamente a Tolstoi en sus apuntes para la obra.

Originalmente concebida como un gran fresco en 5 partes (Tempestad en junio, Dolce, Cautividad, Batallas, La paz) sólo escribió las dos primeras, ya que fue interrumpida por la detención y el traslado al campo de concentración de Auschwitz, donde murió de tifus. Su hija no se atrevió a leer el contenido hasta final de siglo, ya que pensaba que eran diarios personales y temía que le afectaran, pero descubrió una novela magnífica y luminosa que fue finalmente publicada en 2004.

La primera parte, Tempestad en junio, retrata la huida de distintas familias de París ante la llegada inminente de los alemanes. Así se nos introducen una serie de personajes que serán recurrentes en la obra y dan una idea general de la situación. La mirada de la autora es desmitificadora y pone énfasis los aspectos más crudos del éxodo:

Y pensar que nadie lo sabrá, que alrededor de todo esto se urdirá tal maraña de mentiras que aún acabarán convirtiéndolo en una página gloriosa de la historia de Francia. Removerán cielo y tierra para sacar a la luz actos de sacrificio, de heroismo... ¡Con lo que yo he visto, Dios mío! Puertas cerradas a las que se llamaba en vano para pedir un vaso de agua, refugiados saqueando casas... Y en todas partes, en lo más alto y lo más bajo, el caos, la cobardía, la vanidad, la ignorancia... ¡Ah, qué grandes somos!

También pone atención a las diferentes clases sociales y cómo los ricos tienen más recursos para hacer frente a la catástrofe, siendo su principal preocupación en muchos casos salvaguardar sus objetos más preciados y conservar sus privilegios a toda costa.

La segunda parte contrasta con el caos y la agitación de la primera y en vez de carreteras colapsadas por gente que huye aterrorizada, nos encontramos en un ambiente bucólico, en un pequeño pueblo ocupado por los alemanes, donde los habitantes tienen que colaborar e incluso hospedar en sus casas a algunos oficiales. En algunos momentos la convivencia es buena, la autora nos presenta a unos soldados respetuosos con la población civil y a unos oficiales cultos y humanos. Describe magistralmente cómo encaja la ocupación en la tranquila vida del pueblo:

Entre los blancos racimos se veían hojitas alargadas y cubiertas de un vello plateado; a la sombra, eran de un verde suave; al sol, parecían de color rosa. El jardín se extendía a lo largo de una calle estrecha, una calleja de pueblo bordeada de casitas, en una de las cuales habían instalado su polvorín los alemanes. Un centinela caminaba de un lado a otro bajo un cartel rojo que, en gruesas letras negras, rezaba: VERBOTEN.

La historia de amor es preciosa y nos hace vivir escenas inolvidables visualizando el oscuro interior de la casa donde Lucile se siente encerrada con su suegra y la luz y la alegría que le aporta el oficial alemán, con sus paseos por el jardín y su música. Lucile no renuncia a su patria y se siente desgarrada interiormente, pero llega a entender los sentimientos del enemigo:

Los tres oficiales se levantaron y dieron sendos taconazos. En su respeto había un tinte de melancolía enternecida: era como si, gracias a ella, recuperaran un poco de la vida de antaño, en la que la amabilidad, la buena educación y la gentileza hacia las mujeres eran virtudes más valiosas que beber en exceso o tomar al asalto una posición enemiga. En su actitud hacia ella había agradecimiento y nostalgia; Lucile lo comprendía y se sentía conmovida.

En conjunto, una grandísima novela y un documento de su tiempo, paradójicamente exento de rencor y amargura hacia aquellos que la acabaron destruyendo.

[Cláudia Azevedo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Foi com grande comoção que acabei este livro. Irene Némirovsky, escritora de origem russa e judaica, não poderia imaginar que seria vítima desta guerra que retrata. Cheguei a sentir-me uma intrusa, enquanto lia Tempestade em Junho e Dolce, os dois capítulos que lhe sobrevivem. Seriam cinco ao todo e há notas da autora que indicam a sua vontade de alterar algumas passagens.
Impressionou-me a abordagem da diferença das classes sociais face à atrocidade, o preconceito existente. As relações entre ocupados e ocupantes, com todas as dúvidas e emoções que lhes subjazem, são outro tópico forte. Coloca-se também o dedo na ferida do colaboracionismo versus patriotismo.
Intriga-me se Irene teria criado uma das suas personagens, Lucile, que balança entre o amor por um alemão e o patriotismo, se soubesse que morreria num campo de concentração. O marido morreria meses mais tarde, igualmente às mãos dos nazis. Ambos de origem russa, terão sido executados como bolcheviques judeus, embora tenham perdido a fortuna da família por causa do comunismo e embora fossem católicos. Deixaram duas filhas, que se salvaram graças às coragem de uma amiga. A vida de ambos dava outro livro.
Aprendi muito, refleti mais ainda. Aconselho.

[Rosa · Rating 3 out of 5]

ایرن نمیروفسکی، وسط وحشت جنگ، تبعید و فرار، زندگی روزمره‌ی مردم رو اول توی ذهنش و بعد روی کاغذ ثبت کرده تا قصه ی آشفتگی فرانسه تحت اشغال با سوییت فرانسوی خلق بشه و همین نگاه از نزدیک و بی‌واسطگی در درک شرایطه که به متن اصالت داده...
کتاب روایت خطی و پر تعلیقی نداره، بلکه بخش های پراکنده ای از زندگی آدم های مختلفیه که در بازه ی زمانی خاص و موقعیت‌ مشابهی گرفتار شدن. بعضی از اون ها توی این مسیر با هم مواجه میشن و برخی هم نه، گاهی سرنوشت شخصیت ها در لابلای فصل های این کتاب رقم میخوره و‌ آخر و عاقبت تعدادیشون هم در نصفه ی راه رها میشه : از سرباز و پناهنده گرفته تا خانواده‌های بورژوا و روستایی‌های ساده... و تلخ ترین سرنوشت مربوط به کشیش جوونیه که شاید نگاهش به بچه های پرورشگاهی که اطرافش هستن کمی حس خود برتر پنداری بده، اما بعد اتفاقی که براش میفته اون حس سرزنش امیز رو از ضمیر مخاطب پاک میکنه، جوری که در آخر نمیدونی به حال کشیش دل بسوزونی یا بین حس انزجار از ناسپاسی و خشونت بچه ها و درک محرومیت ها و تبعیض هاشون، کدوم حس رو عادلانه تر بدونی! همین چندصدایی بودن، داستان رو جذابش می‌کنه، ولی گاهی هم باعث میشه وسط این همه آدم و خط داستانی ، کمی سردرگم بشیم.
نمیروفسکی، دقیق و تیزبین به حال و هوای داستانش پرداخته، انگار به جای هرکدوم از اون ها ،بارها از دل کوچه‌ها، قطارهای پناهنده‌ها، خونه‌های تاریک و دهکده‌های اشغال‌شده رد شده، که البته دلیلش هم اینه که واقعا بخشی از این لحظات رو تجربه کرده و به چشم دیده! زبانش بی‌پیرایه‌ست، نه خیلی شاعرانه و نه خیلی خشک. اما یه جور ظرافت هم در توصیف‌هاش هست که لحن رو خوشخوان می‌کنه.
سوییت فرانسوی، بیشتر از اینکه درباره‌ی قهرمانی یا تراژدی‌های بزرگ باشه، درباره‌ی کوچیک‌ترین واکنش‌های انسانی در دل فاجعه‌ست: خودخواهی، ترس، دلبستگی، عشق، منفعت‌طلبی، رذالت و تعامل. این نگاه انسانی، نقطه‌ی قوت اثرشه. اما خب، اگه دنبال هیجان یا گره‌گشایی کلاسیک باشیم، این کتاب شاید راضی‌ مون نکنه.
نویسنده به‌نظرم بیش از هرچیز به دنبال ثبت لحظه‌به‌لحظه‌ی واقعیت ها بوده، با همون شدتی که خودش از نزدیک دیده و حس کرده. همین باعث میشه کتاب تا حدی به سندی توصیفی_ تاریخی شبیه باشه، نه فقط ی رمان سرگرم‌کننده. و وقتی بدونیم خود نویسنده کمی بعد از نوشتن این صفحات تو اردوگاه آشویتس کشته شده، و این دست نوشته ها چه مسیری رو تا منتشر شدن طی کردن، متن داستان، وزنی مضاعف پیدا می کنه، انگار این کلمات آخرین ردپای اون در زندگیش هستن....
"سوییت فرانسوی" کتابیه پر از جزئیات انسانی، با نگاهی عمیق و صادقانه، ولی نه خیلی پرکشش یا کامل. ارزشش بیشتر در تاریخ و سرنوشت نویسنده و اون لحظه‌ی خاصه که متن ازش متولد شده. از طرفی هم فکر میکنم شاید نمیروفسکی فرصتی برای ویرایش این داستان نداشته تا بتونه با ی بازخوانی مناسب، ‌نواقص اونو به راحتی برطرف کنه تا اثر عمیق تری بر مخاطبش بذاره....⭐️ 3.5

[Théo d'Or]

Sasha, the woman in love with Volodea, in Shiskin's " The Light and the Dark" tells her lover, in one of the letter sent, that, thinking better, realized that no great book and no work of genius is about love.
" It just gives the impression that they are about love, to be interesting. But in fact, they are about death. In books, love is a kind of shield, or rather - a kind of scarf over the eyes ; so that you cannot see. For not to be frightened. "
The biography of the writer Nemirovski , as well as the disturbing history of the survival of the " French Suite " - can be seen, today, after Holocaust, in no other way than as attempts to trick a cruel and tragic destiny, which Nemirovski tried to annihilate by using the scarf over the eyes.
In '42, she was picked up from her home, and transported to Auschwitz, then killed on 17 August, same year.
What was saved, when no form of dodging, love, money or faith could stop the march of death was this book, and this happened by pure chance.
The volume is designed as a never-ending trilogy in which the author dramatizes the agony of the French during the Nazi invasion. We are witnessing, somehow, an invasion of the French on the French, from Paris to province, which takes place under the sign of the horror caused by the imminent arrival of the Nazis. It is curious, but explicable, that they are never called " Nazis ". At that time, there were called " German soldiers invading France ".
The one who described them didn't live to give them their names in the history textbooks. Nemirovski's writing shows the concern with which this book was written, intuiting that everything will end in a very short time.
The French Suite , unfinished, carries in its very truncated form this tragic truth, of the implacability of a brutal ending.
As everything around her fell apart, Nemirovski found a sense to write, alone, in the forrest, crouched on her blue sweater, and this image, superimposed on the survival story of the manuscript - tells a great deal about the purpose and urgency of writing, especially when everything is so frightening.
The author undertook a difficult task, practically writing her contemporary history, without knowing its end. The novel has not only a spectacular destiny, but also an excellent construction, and a general humanist vision, without being melodramatic. She does not victimize her character, but portrays them in a naturalistic light.
The Pericard family cram their precious but absolutely useless things, before escaping from Paris, without understanding the scale of the disaster. Blinded by conventionalism they postpone their departure indefinitely, but not out of altruism, but because their monogrammed laundry are still washing....
It would be an exaggeration, though, to believe that Nemirovski wrote an acid or vindictive critique of French society, which expelled her without any scruples, on ethnic grounds.
Horrors bring to the surface a complex psychology, good growth perishes, leaving room for the primary need for survival. " The French Suite " is not a fantastic novel because it's about World War II, nor because its author had a tragic end, but exclusively based on its qualities. The writing is dynamic, and captures the immense final tragedy of any war.
No principle, and no ideal covers the meaninglessness of the catastrophes, ultimately caused by humanity itself.

[Amaranta · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Tolone S/Arroux 13 luglio 1942 - ore 5 [scritta a matita e non obliterata]
“Copro di baci le mie bambine adorate, e che la mia Denise faccia sempre la brava... Ti stringo forte sul cuore insieme con Babet, che il buon Dio vi protegga. Quanto a me, mi sento calma e forte” .

Non avevo mai letto nulla della Nemirovsky e ho sfidato la sorte cominciando con il suo ultimo e incompiuto.
Suite francese è apparentemente un libro semplice. Un’opera pensata come una sinfonia, più tempi, ogni personaggio studiato nelle sue infinite sfaccettature, ma avrà il tempo di scrivere solo due movimenti. Tempesta di giugno: un’esodo lontano dalla guerra che avanza, da Parigi; borghesi e poveri la guerra arriva per tutti, anche se diversamente. E’ l’occhio di una telecamera che avanza, stringe, mette a fuoco su una serie di personaggi curiosi, gretti, meschini, semplici o piccoli eroi, innamorati o odiati. Dolce: sembra entrare nel vivo dei sentimenti di questa gente, respirare con le loro emozioni. I soldati tedeschi sono nemici, ma allo stesso tempo uomini.
"Mia moglie" disse "mi aspetta, o meglio aspetta qualcuno che è partito per la prima volta quattro anni fa e che non tornerà mai... del tutto uguale. L'assenza è un fenomeno ben strano!"
E la bellezza di alcune descrizioni della natura stride con il tema della guerra ma rende la dolcezza dell’anima: “ La luce calava a poco a poco e i rami dei ciliegi in fiore si facevano azzurrognoli e leggeri come piumini pieni di cipria.”
Quello che mi ha colpito è che non c’è ombra di odio in questo libro. Irene cercava di terminarlo in una corsa contro il tempo, sapendo lei stessa di essere braccata, non si curava di sé perché la fine era certa, avrebbe solo voluto del tempo per completare. E questa credo sia la più grande lezione che un libro possa offrire, il più grande regalo che uno scrittore possa fare ai suoi lettori: se stesso.
La corrispondenza che chiude il libro è stata per me la parte più toccante. L’ansia e la concitazione di quei momenti passa tutta attraverso le parole. E pensare che mentre il marito si dava da fare per liberarla lei fosse già morta è la cosa più triste.
“ Giovedì mattina - luglio '42 - Pithiviers [scritta a matita e non obliterata]
Mio amato, mie piccole adorate, credo che partiamo oggi. Coraggio e speranza. Siete nel mio cuore, miei diletti. Che Dio ci aiuti tutti.

[Carlo Mascellani · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sullo sfondo della Seconda Guerra Mondiale, in una Francia occupata dai Tedeschi, si stagliano vicende di svariati protagonisti, tutti diversi tra loro per indole, estrazione sociale, valori. Odi, grettezza, avidità, bontà d'animo, orgoglio nazionale, soprattutto speranza, fanno da sfondo a questo complesso, esauriente quadro sociale, in cui l'evento bellico sembra fungere da movente per porre in discussione determinati valori o confermar i fondamenti degli altri. Due popolazioni che si sfiorano per poi nuovamente separarsi: due universi che, seppur inconciliabili a causa delle circostanze, sembrano lasciar trapelare quel fragile tentativo di condivisione che sembra voler trascender l'orrore della guerra e veder consolidarsi quel raro sentimento universale definito umanità.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Irene Nemirovsky was an Ukrainian-born Jew whose family fled Kiev during the Russian Revolution; she moved to Paris in her teens, and converted to Catholicism. Her first novel, David Golder, was a success, and the first two sections--novellas--of a planned five volume work, Suite Francaise, were published more than fifty years after her death (in 2004) after her daughter was donating her papers to an archive and the two novellas was found there among her papers, packaged as one (incomplete) novel.

Nemirovsky was denied French citizenship in 1938, and died in Auschwitz in 1939. I looked up information about her because I knew there had been some controversies surrounding her life and writing--was she a “self-hating Jew”? David Golder featured an unflattering portrait of a Jewish main character, based in part on a relative, I think, and Suite Francaise, while seen in many ways as auto-fiction, based in many ways on her own life as it happened to her during The Occupation, written as she was experiencing it, depicts no characters who are identified as Jewish. Some people think of the novel as somehow anti-French, but let me respond to that below.

Though I knew none of this specifically--only a little of it vaguely, based on my sketchy memory--when I read with fascination the story of what it might have/must have been like as disbelieving Parisians slowly acknowledged the Nazi advance on their beloved City of Light, and escaped, as refugees, to the country.

I am not sure if it is my earliest image of the sad invasion of Paris by the Nazis, this defiling of the City of Light, but this is my strongest early image: The singing, in the bar, of La Marseilles, of the French citizens/emigres in the film Casablanca. The image is thrilling, tears-inducing, what the war was all about, The Resistance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOeFh...

But of course I knew that the German invasion was not only responded to with resistance in France. In recent years I’ve read works by Nobel-Prize-winning Patrick Modiano where he explores the role his own father played in collaboration with the occupying Nazis. In Suite Francaise there is, among refugee Parisians fleeing the chaos of the Nazi invasion, some people scrambling to protect their own interests, naturally. In the first section or novella, Storm in June, we see hordes of people heading out of the city to rural areas not at all equipped to handle the hundreds of thousands of people arriving into their towns.

Food and lodging and other necessities are suddenly scarce. Naivete and bewilderment and denial and anger and fear seem to reign as many simply can’t seem to accept that the city is vulnerable, even as the blitzkrieg steadily advances. The rich in particular act greedily, bribing their way to advantage, no surprise. Can we assume there is a kind of solidarity? No, not much, in Nemirovsky’s experience or rendering. As with any crisis, as in the recent pandemic, there is hoarding/price-gouging, misinformation, class divisions, and so on. In one episode I read she had marked for possible revision (thinking it may have been too melodramatic), a priest taking several boys in his charge faces a sudden “Lord of the Flies”-type experience, horrible. As with any opening volume, we meet several people in various places fighting for survival in the panicked situation. It's cinematic, explosive. And the view we get of beautiful Paris as the action transpires is loving, lyrical, sad.

In the second volume, Dolce, we focus our attention more "telephotically" on a small rural town, which the Nazis now occupy. It is quiet there, most of the people are not particularly political, and the Nazi occupiers are mainly seen as what they surely were: Young boys and men, stuck in a town for months, often living in rooms once occupied by sons or husbands now serving in the French army, or in camps for the defeated army. One woman, Lucile, gets to know a Nazi lieutenant, Bruno, living in their house, and she develops a very close relationship to him. They have intense talks, he plays the piano for her, some of the soldiers become somewhat humanized for them and us, at least temporarily, until a drunken teenager, told to go home after curfew, takes a swing at a Nazi.

The young men are mostly gone from these towns, and some of the girls develop some flirting (or maybe more) connections with the Nazi men (though he author never calls them Nazis, she only calls them Germans, for some reason, maybe political, as she is writing her work in hiding). If the first novella/section has is fast paced, depicting the chaos in sort of wide angle lens, this second volume slows down, and we see some of the hoarding, collaboration, and more focused and complicated emotional relationships in one location.

This second novella reminded me of other stories I know of friendships/love across enemy lines, such as a YA novel, The Summer of my German Soldier, and All Quiet at the Western Front, among others. Soldiers from all sides of a conflict are seen as human beings, with families at home. Soldiers are mostly children, after all. Just boys. . . but they were all conscripted to invade a country and murder locals. But in the end the Nazi soldiers are called to go to the Russian front, and the town is left in a kind of bizarre emotional state, mostly relief, of course. Maybe this is a kind of spoiler: At one point a French local had killed a Nazi, and was being hidden in the town. Lucile has to make a choice between her personal and political commitments.

I thought this was beautifully written, completely engaging, and maybe especially so since Nemirovsky was writing this on the run, first draft. I think it is a powerful picture of human frailty in war, and yes, some solidarity, and endurance, a great and tragically unfinished war story, probably one of the first Occupation novels. And then think of Nemirovsky, whose family were refugees from Ukraine, then from Paris to rural areas, and now we see Ukrainian refugees, yet again.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really really wanted to love this book... Instead I'm having a hard time deciding what I really think about it, other than that I pushed through it to finish.

WWII is a somber subject, no way around it and so, of course, the book is somber. But even somber subjects can be compelling and I had a hard time finding a reason to be compelled...

There are two "books" within the cover and I feel like I need to review each quickly but separately. (perhaps this is part of my struggle - it felt almost like a short story rather than a full novel)

I struggled most with the first book which were stories about people (families, singles, employers and employees) fleeing Paris following the defeat of the French army by the Germans. The entire time I read I/it felt pointless - perhaps this was the point of the story, fleeing one danger into another, one tragedy into another, one potential death into a different death. The pointlessness of it all?? (Ok maybe it's not just somber, it's DARK)

The second book followed a village occupied by the German troops. It was an insightful look into how occupation changed the relationships between the village residents AND how relationships form between occupier and occupied. This story, though once again with strains of hopelessness and pointlessness (at the end especially), had characters that were a little more sympathetic. They felt fleshed out and real, rather than just a caricature of a certain "type" of person.

Two interesting things about the book, though. One is that the author was French and was living through occupation of France during WWII (this would explain the tone of the book!) She eventually was killed in Auschwitz. Second is that she meant to write a book in 5 parts but was only able to complete 2. So, the story is unfinished, the characters just created and the story just beginning to be told. I would have liked to read the rest of her creation.

[Sandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sono rimasta incantata da questa scrittrice che conoscevo poco. La lettura di Suite francese mi ha svelato una persona straordinaria, dotata di uno sguardo saggio e benevolo, ricolmo di empatia nei confronti dell’universo, sia della natura -che è protagonista costante delle storie, anche tragiche, dei suoi racconti- che degli uomini, donne e bambini che spiccano nelle sue pagine con vivezza e profondità psicologica. Non francesi o tedeschi, ma “uomini” e “donne”. Leggendo i due racconti che compongono il volume, si è immersi fin dalle prime righe nella tragedia della guerra e delle sofferenze che ne derivano: il primo racconto, “temporale di giugno”, è la narrazione corale di un popolo che fugge, cioè dei parigini che abbandonano in fretta la città alla notizia dell’occupazione tedesca; il secondo invece, “Dolce”, racconta un microcosmo, la vita di un paesino di campagna in cui arriva l’esercito tedesco, l’invasore che occupa le case dei civili, e non solo. La grandezza della scrittrice sta nel far entrare il dramma della guerra nell’animo del lettore con parole dolci, sommesse e pacate, con la descrizione di una natura gaia e pronta all’esplosione dell’estate nei colori e nei profumi, con la giocondità dei giochi infantili dei bimbi francesi che vivono ingenuamente l’occupazione tedesca, con le emozioni del cuore di uomini e donne che, senza distinzione di provenienza, siano francesi che vivono in miseria, siano tedeschi che soffrono la nostalgia di casa, si riscoprono ricchi nell’animo. Accanto a scene così delicate spicca con ancor più drammaticità la meschinità degli animi di coloro che fuggono dalle loro case per l’avanzata tedesca portando con sé gli egoismi e l’ipocrisia dei propri caratteri, accentuati dalla paura della guerra, quei ricchi borghesi così tanto attaccati alle loro proprietà, siano esse reali o letterarie, da essere pronti a quei sacrifici cui non sono avvezzi e che colpiscono ogni essere umano di fronte alla guerra, per portarle in salvo.
Perché “l’essere umano è complesso, molteplice, diviso, misterioso, ma ci vogliono le guerre o i grandi rivolgimenti per constatarlo. E’ lo spettacolo più appassionante e più terribile…; il più terribile perché è il più vero: non ci si può illudere di conoscere il mare senza averlo visto nella tempesta come nella bonaccia. Solo chi ha osservato gli uomini e le donne in un periodo come questo può dire di conoscerli – e di conoscere sé stesso”. Parole come queste, così sagge e dai toni tolstojani, mi hanno conquistato, soprattutto pensando che sono state scritte pochi mesi prima della deportazione e della morte ad Auschwitz. Una gran donna, Irène Némirovsky!

[Megan Baxter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Suite Francaise was a book that I wasn't sure about until I started to read it, and got swept up in the story, the characters, and Nemirovsky's merciless eye for human grace and ridiculousness, often both encapsulated in the same moments. The book covers the surrender of Paris, and the later occupation of a small town by the Germans, in two discrete sections, although a few characters bridge the gap.

Note: The rest of this review has been withdrawn due to the changes in Goodreads policy and enforcement. You can read why I came to this decision here.

In the meantime, you can read the entire review at Smorgasbook

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not sure which is more eerie: that this is a posthumous novel, or that the author knew it would be a posthumous novel; that had it not been for her daughters who carried it around as a notebook, this novel would not have surfaced, or that the book gave a vivid snapshot of the exodus from Paris which mother and daughters were experiencing at that moment; that her husband was killed for inquiring about his missing famous-writer wife, or that her daughters were then hunted down by the same madmen; that the daughters lost both their parents, or that their own grandmother refused to take them in after they knocked at her door in desperation?

I've read many war novels but this is the first I have seen really capture the immediacy of the despondency of exiles. The disheveled state of mind that comes with the refugee status. One minute you're the person you know, the next minute, you're someone even you don't recognize.

It is the eve of the Nazi occupation of 1940. The book starts with a wealthy family who is fleeing to a second home in the country. There is the famous writer who fights to save his manuscripts. A middle class couple who fights to save their job but can't make it across the country because of the lack of transportation. Parked cars are everywhere, hotels and inns are filled with refugees, restaurants are closed because of lack of food or lack of paying patrons,people are begging for food and water, some sleeping in abandoned cars, some camping out on the road. Imagine a huge traffic jam of people who must walk to get anywhere and even then, might find that they're being stopped by a road block of soldiers who have sealed their territory from the enemy. The perils of war that Nemirovsky captures oh so well.

The chaotic situation is captured through a slew of characters and an emphatic plot. Unfortunately, this was one book that was not completed:

Nemirovsky began...by writing notes on the work in progress and thoughts inspired by the situation in France...She dreamed of a book of a thousand pages, constructed like a symphony...she took Beethoven's Fifth Symphony as a model.

On 12 June 1942 she began to doubt she would be able to complete this huge endeavour. She had a premonition that she didn't have long to live. But she continued to work on her book, simultaneously writing notes. In her writing she denounced fear, cowardice, acceptance of humiliation, of persecution and massacre. She was alone. It was rare to find anyone in the literary and publishing worlds who did not choose to collaborate with the Nazis.

Although the novel is divided into two parts that could have been novellas ("Storm in June and "Dolce"), they are connected with some of the same characters and the overarching theme of war and displacement, so it still feels like a novel. Knowing what happened after, it is interesting to note that the book is not about the evacuation of Jews, rather it is a novel about Parisians in general, wealthy and poor, fleeing German invasion, some even having to share their homes with German soldiers.

At the time she was interned in the concentration camp (she was of Jewish heritage but also a Catholic) Irene was a famous writer. Nine novels. She was a literature student whose first book had been published in her mid twenties. But as we know now in reading about that period in history, none of this mattered. When she was taken away, her husband didn't know that at that time, to be arrested and deported meant death. So he wrote many letters inquiring about her whereabouts. Later, he too would be taken away and her young daughters would spend a lot of time hiding from the French police.

The letters her husband wrote are included in the appendices, revealing the saddening situation. This is one book that you cannot read without reading the appendix.

Irene's daughter, Elizabeth would later become an editor at a publishing house. Elizabeth's sister Densie would take the suitcase that contained the manuscripts, the same suitcase that had traveled with them from hiding place to hiding place, type it up, and entrust it to the archives and a publisher. Hence, the novel we get to read.

[Overbooked ✎ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I realise that left Suite Francaise on my shelves for too long. I bought it because it was a well-loved bestseller, but I delayed the read because I mistook it for a historical war-romance novel (I find myself in the minority when it comes to my opinions on the genre, e.g. my bad experience with The Nightingale).
This book pleasantly surprised me. This is not an action book like so many others set in wartime France. There are no acts of bravery and no heroes here, no linear story line. The book is an album, a collection of portraits where the well-drawn characters happen to live in highly dangerous and volatile times.

I loved the subtle, evocative prose and the quiet, introspective quality of the writing, which contrasts with the turmoil caused by the war. In the first part, the author vividly describes the chaos and the disorder of the Paris evacuation in the wake of France humiliating defeat.
The second part is about a community living in a country village occupied by the Germans. The locals have reluctantly come to terms with their nation surrender, and now must endure and adjust to a foreign occupation.

For me, this book captures the essence of the French in the 40s, with their traditions, values, social status prerogatives and quirks. The characters are not clichés or caricatures; they felt three-dimensional, real and genuine people.

The author own story and her personal correspondence, which are included in the appendixes, were heart-breaking to read. The fact that her work was left incomplete because of her deportation and tragic death makes the novel even more poignant.
Highly recommended. 4.5 stars.

Fav. quotes:

In the snow, Jeanne and Maurice Michaud waited their turn, leaning against each other like weary horses during a short pause in their journey.

Lucile began to embroider, but soon set down her work. The cherry blossom above her head was attracting wasps and bees; they were coming and going, darting about, diving into the centre of the flowers and drinking greedily, heads down and bodies trembling with a sort of spasmodic delight, while a great golden bumblebee, seemingly mocking these agile workers, swayed in the soft breeze as if on a hammock, barely moving and filling the air with its peaceful golden hum.

It’s a truism that people are complicated, multifaceted, contradictory, surprising, but it takes the advent of war or other momentous events to be able to see it. It is the most fascinating and the most dreadful of spectacles, she continued thinking, the most dreadful because it’s so real; you can never pride yourself on truly knowing the sea unless you’ve seen it both calm and in a storm. Only the person who has observed men and women at times like this, she thought, can be said to know them.

People who always pay the price and the only ones who are truly noble. Odd that the majority of the masses, the detestable masses, are made up of these courageous types.

[Seth T. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Recognizing beforehand that this wouldn't be a complete story arc, I had to try to approach the book without any prejudice toward it for having a weak ending (i.e., no ending). Unfinished books can be interesting to read to view the storytelling process in the midst of its evolution, but are rarely satisfying as stories in their own right. Némirovsky's work here is perhaps more polished than a simple draft, but even her notes suggest that the finished chapters and two volumes that *were* published are not likely how they would appear in her final product.

So then, what about what we are given?

It's, well, pretty good. It's not riveting by any means. There is no climax to her first act ("Storm in June") and her second act plays out pretty softly (appropriately enough for a section entitled "Dolce"). While each segment picks up interest in later chapters, both start off at such a slowburn that many readers won't make it past a hundred pages. Character-wise, Némirovsky doesn't provide the reader with many sympathetic characters either. Not only are almost all the inhabitants of her story arrogant hypocrites, but they are almost universally uninteresting as well.

The first book is a pile of vignettes describing the circumstances of several families and individuals as they flee Paris on the eve of its fall into German hands on 14 June 1940. The narrative is as disorganized and haphazard, perhaps, as was the exodus it chronicles. There are flourishes of course and moments of interest (notably a chapter written from the perspective of a cat in heat), but on the whole it functions better as documentary than as story. The second book is easily superior, but much slower paced. There are more sympathetic characters and much more time for introspection. In a way, book two ("Dolce") could function as some sort of Jane Austen work, only with Nazis and crap.

Back to characters. Reading, Suite Française, I first thought that Némirovsky was an out-and-out misanthrope, despising all humanity, no matter its form or station. Gradually, I came to see that there is a certain class of person whom Némirovsky bears little ill will and seems to believe at least capable of being both genuine and rational. Those people seem to fit in the lower middle class and be young enough to still see beauty in the world (the Michaud couple are only in their early forties or so, and are an exception to the youthfulness qualification). Her sympathetic characters are the Michauds, Jean-Marie Michaud, Lucile, the young engaged couple fleeing from Paris on their wedding day, Bruno (the German soldier staying with Lucille's family), Madeleine (to some extent), and Hubert (after he rejects the hypocrisy and privilege of his class).

I should note I really did appreciate Némirovsky's ability to describe the hypocrisies of her characters through the various perspectives of her other characters. This actually makes it a little more difficult to pin down the author's own feelings toward others.

I'd be curious to read Némirovsky's other works to see how she paints the classes as a general rule, but if they're not more interesting books than Suite Française, I think I'll skip.

[AC · Rating 2 out of 5]

Némirovsky was a Russian Jew who emigrated as a child to France. There, she became a popular and successful writer, converted to Roman Catholicism, became an anti-semite who associated with right-wing (fascist) writers and editors, but who by 1942 was deported to Auschwitz and gassed. Her husband was murdered soon afterwards. She left a lengthy manuscript in a diary that was in the possession of her daughter, who refused to look at it all her life -- thinking it was only a diary and that reading it would be upsetting. When she finally did look at it and discovered it actually contained a manuscript, she had it published. The backstory is quite interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irène_Né...

The book was conceived as 1,000 page Magnum Opus -- the author was very conscious that she was writing her manuscript -- a War and Peace for the Modern Era. But in fact, only two of the five parts (Storm in June and Dolce) were more or less completed; and a third part Captivity (about the concentration camps) apparently is still in manuscript form. What we have here, Storm and Dolce, amount to two novellas.

What is interesting about these books is that they are written by someone living the events almost in real time, but they are not a diary, but a very well structured fictional work. In other words, there is detachment, as well as passion to it.

Storm consists of a series of interlocking vignettes, as Némirovsky follows a set of characters fleeing Paris in the tumultuous week of the invasion. It is very moving and, apart from one or two false notes (one can see the seams, as it were), quite brilliant (5-stars). The immortality that Némirovsky wanted will have to rest on this slender little novel.

Dolce is extremely mediocre - it is about the lusts of some sexually frustrated frenchwomen who are falling in love with these hypermasculine blond Nazis. The Nazis are glorified, their muscles are described many times, they are all poets and musicians, highly cultivated, invariably polite, and seductive -- only the French men in the story seem to be not too thrilled with them -- but those men are boorish peasants, so WTF do they know...

The story drips with fascist sympathies -- the anti-German patriotism of the characters is the patriotism that loves "le Marèchal!" (i.e., Petain)..... What is worse, the story is melodramatic and -- nobody even goes to bed. They don't even get around to kissing. 3 stars. And this, remember, was being written by a woman who was months away from the gas-chamber....

If you read this book, be sure to read the short Appendix I - which contains notes by the author on events and on her plotted of the novel. It contains some gems. E.g.:

"The French grew tired of the Republic as if she were an old wife. For them, the dictatorship was a brief affair, adultery. But they intended to cheat on their wife, not to kill her. Now they realize she's dead, their Republic, their freedom. They're mourning her."

Or...

"The most hated men in France in 1942: Philippe Henriot and Pierre Laval. The first as the Tiger, the second as the Hyena: around Henriot you can smell fresh blood, and around Laval the stench of rotting flesh."

The translation, as you can see from this, is wonderful.

Anyway - a mixed bag -- find the good in it, chuck the dross. A good companion piece to Wescott's Apartment (also about the Occupation), though not to be compared with Wescott in quality.

[Jaq · Rating 3 out of 5]

Irene Nemirovsky, poco prima di essere deportata, in una lettera ad un amico scriveva questo: «Caro amico, non mi dimentichi. Ho scritto molto. Saranno opere postume, temo, ma scrivere fa passare il tempo».

Ispirato alla Quinta sinfonia di Beethoven, Suite francese aveva l'ambizione di essere una grande narrazione della Seconda Guerra Mondiale. Doveva comprendere cinque libri, duecento pagine ciascuno, mille pagine in totale. Irene Nemirovsky non portò mai a termine la sua opera. Venne deportata nel luglio del 1942 e morì nel campo di Auschwitz poco dopo la stesura del secondo romanzo, Dolce. Scrisse le pagine che ci sono pervenute con il presentimento che le rimaneva poco da vivere.

Ho trovato la scrittura di Suite francese scolastica (e lo so che non sono un cazzo di nessuno per definire Irene Nemirovsky scolastica), alternata a sprazzi di genialità lucida, dove l'autrice non nasconde il suo giudizio e il suo astio verso quella classe diligente che reputa la rovina della sua bella Parigi e della Francia, e che durante l'esodo dopo l'occupazione del paese, pensava a salvare le porcellane e riempiva le valigie piene di biancheria.

Giudicava la sua famiglia con amarezza e dolorosa severità; i motivi del suo risentimento non erano formulati in maniera precisa, erano un insieme di immagini brevi e violente: suo padre che diceva della Repubblica «questo regime marcio...», e quella sera stessa, a casa, una cena di ventiquattro persone, con le tovaglie più belle, un foie gras eccellente, i vini più pregiati, in onore di un ex ministro che avrebbe potuto avere di nuovo l'incarico e di cui il signor Pericard ricercava i favori.(Oh! La bocca a culo di gallina di sua madre: «Mio caro Presidente...»). Le automobili cariche di biancheria e di argenteria fino a scoppiare, bloccate in mezzo alla folla dei fuggiaschi, e sua madre che, indicando le donne e i bambini che andavano a piedi con qualche indumento avvolto nel fazzoletto, diceva: «Guardate com'è buono il bambin Gesù. Pensate che avremmo potuto essere al posto di quei disgraziati!». Ipocriti! Sepolcri imbiancati! E lui stesso, che cosa ci faceva lì? Con il cuore pieno di ribellione e di odio, faceva finta di pregare per Philippe! Ma Philippe era... Mio Dio! «Philippe, fratello mio adorato!» bisbigliò, e come se quelle parole avessero avuto un potere divino di consolazione il suo cuore contratto si dilatò e sgorgarono lacrime, calde e irruenti. S'insinuarono pensieri di dolcezza e di perdono; non da lui ma venivano dall'esterno, come se un amico si fosse chinato al suo orecchio e avesse sussurrato: "Una famiglia, una razza che hanno prodotto Philippe non possono essere malvagie. Sei troppo severo, hai visto solo i fatti esteriori, non conosci gli animi..."

La seconda parte del romanzo, Dolce, da cui è stato ispirato il film dell'omonimo romanzo, è estremamente controversa. O almeno, per me lo è stata. Questa parte esterna tutti i sentimenti generati dai francesi durante l'occupazione tedesca; da un lato odio gelido e intransigente contro il nemico, dall'altro ipocrisia e accondiscendenza generate dalla paura, fino ad arrivare a sentimenti di amore. Irene Nemirovsky, che morirà per mano dei tedeschi, vedeva al di là del soldato tedesco, un uomo. Non ho potuto che domandarmi per l'intera lettura, se dopo il brutale insulto che la storia le ha riservato, dopo l'umiliazione di portare una stella sulla giacca, la deportazione e l'orrore vissuto - se dopo tutto ciò - avrebbe avuto ancora lo stesso pensiero.

Un soldato nemico non era mai solo un essere umano di fronte ad un altro - ma portava con sé una folla innumerevole di fantasmi, i fantasmi degli assenti e dei morti. [...] «Signora, sono un soldato. I soldati non pensano. Mi dicono di andare là, e io ci vado. Di combattere, e io combatto. Di farmi uccidere, e io muoio. L'esercizio del pensiero renderebbe la battaglia più difficile, e la morte più terribile.»

La sua incompletezza lascia tante domande, la sensazione che le storie siano state lasciate a metà. Ci sarebbe stato ancora molto da dire.

Sopra ho parlato di sprazzi di genialità; ebbene eccone uno -un po' lungo, okay- ma poi chiudo:

Non era delirio, nè un principio di follia; non era mai stata più fermamente lucida e cosciente di sé stessa; era una sorta di commedia volontaria, l'unica che le procurasse qualche sollievo, come può darne il vino o la morfina. Nell'oscurità, nel silenzio, lei ricreava il passato, riesumava istanti che lesi stessa aveva creduto dimenticati per sempre, portava alla luce dei tesori, ritrovava quella parola di suo figlio, quell'intonazione della sua voce, quel gesto delle sue paffute manine di neonato che davvero, per un secondo, annullavano il tempo. Non era più immaginazione, ma la realtà stessa le veniva restituita in ciò che aveva di imperituro, perchè niente poteva fare in modo che tutto quello non fosse avvenuto. L'assenza, perfino la morte, non potevano cancellare il passato; un grembiulino rosa che suo figlio aveva indossato, il gesto con cui piangendo le aveva teso la mano punta da un’ortica, tutto questo era esistito, ed era in suo potere, finché fosse rimasta in vita, farlo esistere di nuovo. Aveva solo bisogno della solitudine, dell’ombra, e intorno a sé di quei mobili, di quegli oggetti che suo figlio aveva conosciuto. Variava come voleva le sue allucinazioni. E non si accontentava del passato, prefigurava il futuro! Trasformava il presente secondo la sua volontà; mentiva ingannando sé stessa, ma quelle menzogne, essendo opera sua, le erano care. Per qualche breve momento era felice. La sua felicità non doveva subire i limiti imposti dalla realtà. Tutto era possibile, alla sua portata. Prima di tutto, la guerra era finita.

[Noce · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un dipinto a olio in formato digitale


Ci sono libri che ricordano quei pomeriggi invernali in cui guardi la città piovosa, attraverso i vetri della finestra. Guardi le strade, e la gente ti sembra diversa. Uguale nella loro destinazione, ma diversa nel modo di sentire che le attribuisci. Il tutto mentre sorseggi il tuo caffè, con le gambe calde dal contatto col termosifone.

Irène Némirovsky ci regala uno spaccato di mondo eterogeneo e completo, attraverso le parole del suo romanzo, che noi beatamente leggiamo nel calduccio dei nostri letti prima di addormentarci.

Il trionfo di questo romanzo, non è guardare il mondo da un oblò, ma avere la certezza che è rappresentato veramente tutto il mondo, tutte le sfumature possibili dell'umanità.

La distanza storica dal momento in cui viene scritto un libro, a volte ci rende incapaci di capire a pieno il contesto e le ragioni che muovono lo scrittore a volerne lasciare un ricordo; distanza che qua viene completamente annullata dalla sapiente mano di un'autrice estremamente lucida, se si tiene conto che scrisse quest'opera, nel momento stesso in cui viveva i drammi di cui tutti sappiamo l'entità.. e il finale soprattutto.

Non è a caso il rimando nel titolo alle Suite di Bach.

La Némirovsky concepisce fin dall'inizio il suo romanzo in termini di sinfonia musicale. Un ciclo sinfonico, il cui tema conduttore e collegamento, è l'eterno contrasto tra vincitori e vinti, ma ciascun “movimento”, che sia una fuga, che sia un allegro, che sia un andante, è dominato da una ricchezza espressiva senza pari, con una modulazione cromatica delle virtù e dei difetti, che rimanda senza sforzo ad altri personaggi, ad altre storie, ad altri drammi, e non per questo incoerente o contraddittorio. Pur vivendo la storia nel momento in cui la scrive, la scrittrice ne prende le distanze, e spiega le brutture della sua epoca, non attraverso descrizioni accurate di quanto succede veramente, ma attraverso il contrasto, facendoci capire esattamente come mai il buio si spiega con la luce e viceversa.

Il tema è tristemente noto, la Guerra, la sconvolgente Seconda Guerra Mondiale.

Ma ciò che c'è di veramente impressionante in questo libro, sono le pennellate che dipingono ad uno ad uno i personaggi di questa storia e di questa epoca, così lontani da noi nel tempo, ma estremamente vicini nell'esternazione di sentimenti che ci identificano e caratterizzano da sempre, e che tutti conosciamo, dal più abietto al più limpido e puro.

È un oceano di piccoli e grandi storie, puntellate da vergognose cadute in nome dei pregiudizi, e da elevazioni spirituali mosse a volte, solo dalla dignità. Non c'è attualità e non c'è storia.. è un unico grande movimento che ci accomuna tutti, sia coloro che sono stati immortalati attraverso la penna dell'autrice, sia coloro che leggono e che si ritrovano non in uno ma in tutti i personaggi.

Sarebbe bello pensare che il finale di questo romanzo, sia un finale aperto, e non un'opera incompiuta perché la scrittrice è stata deportata.

Eppure un finale c'è. Glielo attribuiamo noi, continuando a pensarci dopo che abbiamo chiuso il libro, e glielo attribuisce l'appendice finale, in cui vengono trascritte la corrispondenza epistolare della Némirovsky , dei suoi familiari e amici, e i suoi appunti a cornice del manoscritto.

Appunti bellissimi, che valgono quanto il libro, e ci illuminano su quanto lavoro ci sia dietro un manoscritto di questo genere, e quanta passione ci sia dietro la professione di uno scrittore che sia all'altezza dell'etichetta.

[Alice Poon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had picked up this novel at a library book sale several years ago and finally got to reading it. I am not a huge fan of WWII novels. This particular novel attracted my attention mainly due to the fact that the author had lived through the war in France.

The novel consists of the first two parts of a planned five-part epic, which the author was never able to finish as she was arrested shortly after completing those two parts and taken to Auschwitz to be executed.

Part One (The Storm) is a chronicling of events that took place during the German invasion of Paris in the summer of 1940. We meet a spectrum of French nationals ranging from an aristocratic family headed by a museum curator, a famous writer and his mistress, a wealthy hedonist, a banker, to a working class couple and their soldier son, a priest and a whore. The author presents her piercing observation of their differing mentalities and worldviews, mostly dictated by their social status and possessions. In their individual struggle to survive, they are collectively forced to endure physical and emotional upheavals that the war inflicts on them.

Part Two (Dolce) tells the narratives of three families in the village of Bussy during the German occupation from spring to July 1, 1941. The three families represent three different social classes: the aristocrats, the middle-class and the peasant class, and each holds its own values and attitude towards the enemy – the Germans. Through depicting their interaction with the Germans, the author shows us the aristocrats’ pomposity and hypocrisy, the middle-class’s down-to-earth pragmatism and the peasants’ self-righteous effrontery. Woven into this are two thwarted love affairs.

Perhaps this quote captures what in essence was the author’s view on human nature:

Important events – whether serious, happy or unfortunate – do not change a man’s soul, they merely bring it into relief, just as a strong gust of wind reveals the true shape of a tree when it blows off all its leaves.

Overall, Part One was episodic in style, while Part Two was slow-moving and overly descriptive. The two parts read like two separate novellas. Nonetheless the author has keen insights into the human psyche. It’s unsettling to think of the author facing death herself shortly after the writing ends. I’m giving it 3.4 stars.

[MarcoD · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mi è piaciuto molto, il suo essere incompiuto si sente in maniera considerevole soprattutto nella parte finale del romanzo, credo che sarebbe stato un capolavoro. Ambientato in Francia è costituito da due parti, nella prima conosciamo più famiglie ognuna con la sua storia che scappano da Parigi occupata dalle truppe tedesche. Nella seconda parte vengono sviluppate le vicende introdotte nella prima con nuovi personaggi tra cui soldati tedeschi e contadini francesi che mettono in confronto i loro modi di vivere e pensare diametralmente opposti.
Suite francese è come una madre che piange il proprio figlio prigioniero, è la forza del soldato in guerra con la moglie a migliaia di kilometri ma anche la tenacia di un popolo.

[Elaine · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is near on impossible to review this book without first mentioning the author Irene Nemirovsky. A Russian born Jew, settled in France and converted to Catholicism, she started to write Suite Francaise in 1940, two years before her death in Auschwitz. The two novellas included here are the only two completed out of the five that she had planned.

The first, Storm in June, introduces us to the characters as we follow them during the exodus from Paris, fleeing from the German occupiers. There are quite a few people to get to know, some of whom we don’t really see that much of here, presumably because she had been planning to come back to them at some later point. Her characterisation is superb, every character is sharply observed and detailed – they are believable and extremely human with all their faults and foibles exposed. She seemed to take some sort of delight in poking fun at the upper classes, as they pack their treasures – their linen and porcelain, which they cannot do without on the journey. The writing is lyrical, and yet it works more as a commentary of what happened, by someone who was there at the time than as a full blown story.

The second, Dolce, has more of a storyline. After the exodus, the French are settling down to life under German occupation. Lucille Angellier’s husband is a prisoner of war and she lives with her mother in law in a French village. When German officer Bruno is assigned to billet with them she finds herself being drawn to him and it is the story of their relationship. I loved the way she started to introduce back characters from the first story, with the rest of the novellas clearly in mind. It is a gently told tale which really picked up steam during the final quarter, when I was really glued to the book.

Although I really enjoyed the read, it would have been so much better as part of the complete work that she had envisioned. At the end of the book the first appendix consists of her notes and we get some idea from these as to how she saw the global story developing. Such a shame that she didn’t live long enough to write it. The second appendix consists of letters that have survived from her, her husband and various friends and associates, which cover a period of time from 1938 to the end of the second world war and make really poignant reading.

[Jose Carlos · Rating 5 out of 5]

LA GUERRA EN UNA MALETA

Todo, en la vida de Némirovsky, parece destinado a un juego del azar, porque su producción literaria, de una enorme calidad, indiscutible, estaba condenada, una y otra vez, por las circunstancias históricas primero, por las editoriales después, a convertirse en una autora ascensor, es decir, que subió a los altares de la gloria literaria y del mercado, que se precipitó al abismo, para retornar, más de sesenta años después, con mayor fuerza si cabe.

El 13 de julio de 1942 es detenida por la Gendarmería, internada en el campo de tránsito de Pithiviers el día 16. Tan sólo un día después, formando parte del convoy número 6, es deportada a Auschwitz. André Sabatier, editor literario de Albin, intenta solucionar el drama con una carta dirigida a J. Benoist-Méchin, secretario de Estado de la Vicepresidencia del Consejo: es una novelista de enorme talento, argumenta para rogar por la salvación. Sin embargo, el resultado es inútil, los franceses, sometidos a una implacable ley administrativa alemana, no reaccionan.

El asunto Auschwitz merece una especial atención a la hora de evaluar la reentrada de Némirovsky en el panorama literario del siglo XXI: en mi opinión, este ha sido el elemento clave. La recuperación de una autora que cierra su biografía con la palabra Auschwitz no podía pasar desapercibida para una industria que, en particular durante todo el trecho que llevamos del siglo XXI, ha reinterpretado el Holocausto, y cualquier suceso que tenga que ver con la Segunda Guerra Mundial o el nazismo, como un elemento sumamente atractivo que se traduce en ventas y dinero. Esta concepción del Holocausto, más concretamente de Auschwitz como un parque temático o un imaginario de quienes nunca estuvieron allí tiene múltiples culpables (y sería algo a tener muy en cuenta el plantearse estudiar el campo y su representación en el Arte, Literatura y Cine, desde esta perspectiva, como la re-invención de un nuevo imaginario, totalmente ficticio muchas veces).

Dentro de esos culpables, sin duda, dos de los principales son los escritores William Styron, con La decisión de Sophie (1979) y Thomas Keneally, con su Arca de Schindler (1982). Son novelas, ambas, refrendadas con populares películas que han construido ese pastiche hollywoodiense que es Auschwitz en el imaginario del espectador globalizado del siglo XXI. Poner en el disparadero de ventas a una autora que murió allí, es una oportunidad comercial difícilmente rechazable. Más aún si la novela, para mayor suerte, trata de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, el tema de moda más absoluto durante el primer tramo del siglo XXI. Es todo un jackpot.

La figura de Némirovsky se agiganta desde esas premisas y supera así los errores, o los prejuicios, que llevaron a que fuera olvidada. La editorial nos sirve un aspecto de ella, como gancho comercial, terriblemente mentiroso, y cruel, pero que cuadra con el tópico de Hollywood y, al menos, redime a la autora: asesinada en Auschwitz, tal y como pone en todas y cada una de las contraportadas de sus libros. Es cierto, pero técnicamente inexacto. Irène no fue gaseada, como ese asesinada parece sugerir: la cinematográfica cámara de gas vende más que el tifus, y con ello no quiero decir que no sea igualmente execrable el crimen, pero la autora no murió producto de una ejecución indiscriminada, como su marido, o tras una paliza, y sin embargo la imagen que se quiere dar desde la editorial, porque es la imagen de un innegable resultado comercial, es esa; cabe reflexionar aquí sobre cuánta gente tiene en su cabeza, de nuevo ese imaginario falso de quienes nunca estuvieron allí, la muerte de Anna Frank en una cámara de gas y fue, de nuevo, el tifus, una enfermedad que no resta ni un ápice de dramatismo, sufrimiento e indignidad a los sucesos de ambas. Irène, además, era una judía convertida al catolicismo, que no tenía nada que ver, ni el menor punto de conexión, con muchas de las circunstancias de millones de judíos de la Europa Oriental –esos que se nos ofrecen, sistemáticamente, como un artefacto comercial-. La autora debe su recuperación, en parte, a semejante estrategia sin escrúpulos que ofrece una imagen inexacta de ella, demostrándose que, al final, el canon atiende a aspectos políticos, comerciales, de cualquier ámbito, menos al verdaderamente importante: el de calidad literaria. Con ello se desprecia, además, a quienes se interesan por conocer las verdaderas causas y sucesos del Holocausto, y van más allá de la visión espielbergiana del asunto.

La obra de Irène Némirovsky, tras el paréntesis de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, parece haber desaparecido por completo, como si la autora jamás hubiera existido, tragada por la Noche y Niebla del nazismo, tal y como se llamaba el decreto promulgado por Hitler. ¿Qué ocurre, desde entonces, para que actualmente vivamos un boom de la novelista? La clave de ello radica en su obra inacabada, curiosamente, en Suite francesa. Élisabeth y Denise Epstein, las hijas del matrimonio, llevaron consigo una maleta que pertenecía a su madre, repleta de documentos, apuntes, y en la que se encontraba el manuscrito de Suite francesa. Era un cuaderno de letra abigarrada y minúscula, en pésimo papel y con una tinta aguada, que durmió durante años en aquella maleta. Hasta que un día, una de las hijas, convertida en directora literaria, decidió entregar el legado de su madre al Institut Mémoire de l´Edition Contemparaine. Con una lupa, Suite francesa fue mecanografiada, después pasada a ordenador y, finalmente, ordenada en su estado actual. La hija se sorprendió, pues esperaba que aquello se tratase de un diario de los últimos días, y era la obra maestra de su madre. Publicada, al fin, obtendrá en 2004 el premio Renaudot, por vez primera otorgado a un escritor fallecido, las críticas serán unánimes en las publicaciones de mayor prestigio, las traducciones alcanzarán los treinta idiomas y venderá más de un millón de ejemplares en todo el mundo. Su éxito en España no fue menor: Libro del Año 2005 por los libreros de Madrid, y la edición de la editorial Salamandra que alcanza la número 18, según datos de mayo de 2010.

En la novela de Némirovsky, sus protagonistas, porque es una novela coral, tienen un deseo permanente de huida, de escapar del París convertido, por la inminente invasión nazi, en una especie de tela de araña urbana. La ciudad que nos enseña Némirovsky es un reflejo de todo el país, una ciudad de espacios privados, de pisos, de interiores, de cobardías. Esos interiores son recargados, barrocos y delicados, generalmente pertenecen a una clase burguesa alta o a una nobleza decadente, miedosa e insolidaria, preocupada de su propio y exclusivo bienestar. Son pisos repletos de japonerías, de porcelanas, de jarroncillos, de pequeñas piezas de arte que hay que salvar, toda una cacharrería que parece salida de A rebours de Huysmans, y que se va a poner a los pies del elefante de las divisiones acorazadas nazis, que van a pulverizarla. Las casas de vecindad, las ventanas, que poco a poco se irán apagando, abandonados los salones por una población que huye en desbandada, son la imagen de un París que se cierne, maligno, sobre sus habitantes: la ciudad extiende un halo maléfico, peligroso, y cuando interviene en la vida de los personajes, provoca desgracias; cuando no, la muerte.

La ciudad de París es una ciudad de silencios, del silencio de la desbandada. En los barrios, en las calles, sólo se escucha el eco que resuena de los últimos rezagados que oyen los partes de la guerra en sus radios y los cerrojos de las puertas: Las calles estaban desiertas. Los comerciantes echaban los cierres de las tiendas. En el silencio, sólo se oía el ruido metálico, ese sonido que con tanta fuerza resuena en los oídos, las mañanas de sublevación o guerra en las ciudades amenazadas.

La imagen típica y bucólica de París, del París primaveral, salta en añicos ante la inminente tragedia que se avecina: De vez en cuando, en el umbral de alguna casa del bulevar Delessert se veía aparecer un gesticulante grupo de mujeres, ancianos y niños que se esforzaban, con calma al principio, febrilmente después y con un nerviosismo frenético al final, en hacer entrar familias y equipajes en un Renault, en un turismo, en un cabriolé. No se veía una sola ventana iluminada. Empezaban a salir las estrellas, estrellas de primavera, con destellos plateados. París tenía su olor más dulce, un olor a castaños en flor y gasolina, con gotas de polvo que crujen entre los dientes como granos de pimienta. En las sombras, el peligro se agrandaba. La angustia flotaba en el aire, en el silencio.

El mismo ritual que cuando se acudía al campo de vacaciones, el cabriolé con el que se daban los paseos, las maletas colocadas de la misma manera… pero ahora, ante ellos, ante los que huían, se extendía el panorama del terror, bien diferente, extraño e incomprensible de un París amenazado y amenazante. La ciudad experimenta un desnudamiento del alma ante el pánico, un desnudo semejante al de los personajes: La caridad cristiana, la mansedumbre de los siglos de civilización se le caían como vanos ornamentos y dejaban al descubierto su alma, árida y desnuda. ¿Nos habla Némirovsky de sus personajes, de la ciudad, o de toda Francia? De todos, porque París se proyecta en los personajes y los personajes se reflejan en ella. La insolidaridad, las traiciones, el intento de salvarse a costa de lo que sea, no es más que un rasgo oculto, latente, de los urbanitas, que ahora florece ante el desastre y que, en el resto de la novela, en el retrato de los habitantes del campo, de los pueblos, no será tan acusado.

La crueldad de la situación, lo injusto de la Historia, se ve reflejada en la historia de la porcelana, que ha resistido los avatares de la huida, el viaje en cajas, la amenaza de los bombarderos, y el regreso de nuevo a París, y que se quiebra a manos de la portera: La señora Logre, que por fin había acabado el despacho y la biblioteca, volvió al salón para desenchufar la aspiradora. Al hacerlo, el mango del aparato golpeó la mesa sobre la que descansaba la Venus del espejo. La portera ahogó un grito al ver cómo la estatuilla se estampaba contra el parquet. Venus se hizo añicos la cabeza. La ciudad se venga, no acepta que los huidos, los que la dejaron abandonada a su suerte, ahora regresen mansamente. La Venus se ha reventado, pero poco le importará ya eso a Charlie Langelet. Él, como su porcelana, también ha pasado por mucho sufrimiento en el éxodo, hasta poder regresar de nuevo a París. Ha salido de casa porque se merece un buen restaurante, una buena cena como recompensa a sus sufrimientos, pero la niebla, repentina, se ha cernido sobre la ciudad. París ha elegido su venganza. En una curva junto al Sena, donde la visibilidad es menor, un automóvil atropella a Langelet. El alerón del coche le dio de lleno en la cabeza y le destrozó el cráneo.

Como sucede con la Venus de porcelana, la ciudad se ha vengado en Langelet, rompiéndole la cabeza. París ha decidido actuar en la novela, rabiosa, enfadada por el destino que le espera, el de una ocupación humillante y dolorosa. ¿Ha sido París o ha sido la autora? El valor de la obra es indiscutible, como lo es, también, la incomodidad que pudieron sentir los franceses con un texto tan crítico. ¿Qué me hace este país? Ya que me rechaza, considerémoslo fríamente, observémoslo mientras pierde el honor y la vida, se quejaba su autora, y eso decidió hacer, literariamente hablando. Más adelante, también es sus notas, manifestaba: Todo lo que se hace en Francia en cierta clase social desde hace unos años no tiene más que un móvil: el miedo; y en un apunte de 1942: Quieren hacernos creer que vivimos en una época comunitaria en la que el individuo debe perecer para que la sociedad viva, y no queremos ver que es la sociedad la que perece para que vivan los tiranos.

Una obra maestra inacabada, deliciosamente escrita, con ira y dolor contenidos, de una novelista excepcional y reveladora, que recupera el estilo de Dostoievski y Tolstoi y apuesta por la novela de grandes personajes y grandes tramas.

[Marigold · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a fabulous book. Thought-provoking, beautifully written, sad and yet oddly hopeful. Romantic, violent and unflinching. Irene Nemirovsky was a Russian Jew who became exiled from Russia at a young age & had lived in France for many years by the outbreak of the Second World War. Despite being a well-known writer, she was never granted French citizenship. She started Suite Francaise after the outbreak of the war in Europe, wanting to document what she saw going on around her. She planned to write the novel in five parts, as a symphony would be written, and with Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony in mind, with each part of the novel echoing or evoking a particular mood or state of being. She wrote the first two parts, Storm in June and Dolce, and made extensive notes for the third part, plus outline notes about the rest. The notes she made about the book and about what was going on in France at the time, are included in the book & are required reading to appreciate her achievement and the circumstances surrounding it. (Also the heartbreaking letters she & her husband wrote between 1936 & 1945.) In June 1942 Irene felt she would not be able to finish the book, as she became convinced that she would be arrested. She made a will & left detailed instructions with the governess of her two daughters, asking her to care for them if needed. In July 1942 Irene was arrested and deported to Auschwitz, where she died. At the time of her arrest, her husband Michel Epstein, didn’t understand that to be arrested & deported meant only one thing. He wrote a series of letters to everyone he could think of in a position of influence, trying to find out where Irene had been taken (which he didn’t know) & volunteering to take her place in the concentration camp, because of her delicate health. He got no response, & in October 1942 he was also arrested & taken to Auschwitz where he was sent immediately to the gas chamber. After that, the police actually hunted for the daughters – who were hidden by their governess & a series of teachers. The older daughter, Denise, hid the manuscript of Suite Francaise in a suitcase as they were fleeing the village where they’d lived before her father’s arrest. She didn’t realize it was a novel & thought it was a diary of her mother’s. After the war, she kept it but she & her sister never read it, finding it too painful. Many years later, they decided to give the manuscript to an organization dedicated to preserving & documenting the memories of those who died in WWII. Before giving it up, Denise decided to translate & type it out, & only then discovered the novel Suite Francaise, which she then gave to a publisher.

Irene had planned to edit and revise the novel after she had written the five parts, so the two parts contained in the published version are unfinished, but it’s difficult to see how it could have been better, though it’s obvious that the remaining sections would have tied it all together. Storm in June simply tells the stories of a series of loosely connected people fleeing Paris at the start of the German occupation. Some of them are good people, some not so good, many selfish, many ready to do or say anything to the Germans just to get some food, all of them exhausted, hungry and suddenly homeless. It’s a telling picture of what happens to people under the very worst of circumstances, particularly when they’ve had no time to prepare for what’s happening. The second section, Dolce, is a story about a small village where each home and farm has to take in a German occupying soldier. What happens when an attractive, charming, intelligent German officer comes to live with Lucile, whose husband is a prisoner of war but Lucile didn’t like him much to begin with, and Lucile’s mother-in-law? This is a story that makes you think about how you might react in similar circumstances. If your country has been defeated in war, & the victors are coming to live in your village, what can you do besides live with them? Do you become an outlaw, a fighter? Do you resolve to be nice on the outside but continue hating on the inside? Do you wait for an opportunity to kill one if you can? Or, like Lucile’s mother-in-law, would you spend your days shut up in your room to avoid talking to them, in hatred & suspicion & a state of suspended animation until something shakes you out of it. Do you try to find the good in the individual soldiers who are suddenly living in your town, maybe in your own home? If your village in general finds a way to get along with the outsiders, if things are friendly on the outside, is there always a kernel of something on the inside, something that will keep you apart forever? If you were the Germans in the situation, would you try to be kind to the people you had to live with? Would you share your life with them? Could you ever be comfortable and trusting? Or would you always be looking over your shoulder? It was fascinating to learn more about how young people responded to the French occupation, compared to older people who had been through World War I, many of them losing family members to the Germans in that war.

Where Storm is a series of hard-hitting little vignettes, Dolce is a story that builds slowly, using the details of each day – the weather, meals, the life of the farm & village, the books that Lucile reads, the music she listens to – to convey not only the sense of life going on despite horrible circumstances, but also the different ways of responding, & how things are not usually black or white – even in war, people have different & conflicting feelings, sometimes within the course of the same day. Nemirovsky is brilliant at creating two entirely different moods in the two sections. It would have been fascinating to read the other planned sections – if she had carried out her intention of modeling the narrative after a symphonic structure, & had succeeded as well as the first two sections do, I’m sure this would have been one of the masterpieces of the 20th century. What a loss for all of us.