What do you think?
Rate this book
Paris Under the Occupation
A photographic history of Paris and its inhabitants under German occupation
- GenresWorld War II
207 pages, Hardcover
First published September 15, 1989
1 person is currently reading
16 people want to read
About the author
Gilles Perrault
98 books32 followersPseudonym of Jacques Peyroles, a left-wing French enlisted writer and journalist. He attended the Collège Stanislas de Paris and then studied at the Institut d'études politiques, eventually becoming a lawyer, a profession he worked in for five years.
After the success of his essay 'Les parachutistes' (1961), inspired by his military service in Algeria, he became a journalist and wrote articles about Nehru's India, the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo and the problems of African Americans in the United States. He then investigated less well-known aspects of World War II.
Le Secret du jour J (1964) (Secrets of D-Day, 1974) won a prize from the Comité d'action de la Résistance and was an international bestseller. L'Orchestre rouge (1967) was even more successful. In 1969 Perrault published a spy novel, Le dossier 51. In 1978, Gilles Perrault published Le Pull-over rouge, a novel in which he expressed his doubts about Christian Ranucci's guilt (murderer of an 8 years old girl), a French criminal executed by guillotine on July 28, 1976. He was condemned twice for his claims and papers about this case: in 1990 for having talked in a TV-program of "abuse of authority" about the policemen in charge of the investigation (fined 40,000 francs to each person defamed at first instance, and 70,000 francs to each of the five plaintiffs on appeal, as well as the presenter); and in 2008 he and his publisher Fayard were found guilty of defamation toward the Marseille police in the book L'Ombre de Christian Ranucci (fined 5,000 euros and his editor an equal sum, a decision confirmed on appeal in 2009 and granted 10,000 euros in damages to each of the four policemen defamed).
In 1990 Perrault published Notre ami le roi (Our Friend the King, 1993) about the regime and human rights abuses of Hassan II, at the time king of Morocco who had until then been reported positively because of his close relations with the Western world. Perrault's book Le Garçon aux yeux gris (2001) was adapted by André Téchiné for the film Les Égarés.
After the success of his essay 'Les parachutistes' (1961), inspired by his military service in Algeria, he became a journalist and wrote articles about Nehru's India, the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo and the problems of African Americans in the United States. He then investigated less well-known aspects of World War II.
Le Secret du jour J (1964) (Secrets of D-Day, 1974) won a prize from the Comité d'action de la Résistance and was an international bestseller. L'Orchestre rouge (1967) was even more successful. In 1969 Perrault published a spy novel, Le dossier 51. In 1978, Gilles Perrault published Le Pull-over rouge, a novel in which he expressed his doubts about Christian Ranucci's guilt (murderer of an 8 years old girl), a French criminal executed by guillotine on July 28, 1976. He was condemned twice for his claims and papers about this case: in 1990 for having talked in a TV-program of "abuse of authority" about the policemen in charge of the investigation (fined 40,000 francs to each person defamed at first instance, and 70,000 francs to each of the five plaintiffs on appeal, as well as the presenter); and in 2008 he and his publisher Fayard were found guilty of defamation toward the Marseille police in the book L'Ombre de Christian Ranucci (fined 5,000 euros and his editor an equal sum, a decision confirmed on appeal in 2009 and granted 10,000 euros in damages to each of the four policemen defamed).
In 1990 Perrault published Notre ami le roi (Our Friend the King, 1993) about the regime and human rights abuses of Hassan II, at the time king of Morocco who had until then been reported positively because of his close relations with the Western world. Perrault's book Le Garçon aux yeux gris (2001) was adapted by André Téchiné for the film Les Égarés.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 15, 2013
For the most part this is a pictorial essay on the occupation. It focuses on many aspects from the arts to the deportation of the Jews.
The pictures themselves are well worth the look. The author was a child during the occupation and he describes the suffering endured by the people of Paris. It is also important to note that France endured far less hardships than the countries of Eastern Europe.
I also feel the author minimizes the number of the French who embraced collaboration and its sordid aspects. After all, as he points out, it was the French police who isolated and rounded up the Jews. There were many French who admired the Nazis during the 1940 thru 1942 period. With the turning of the tide they became less visible and enthusiastic, but one should not minimize their participation. Nevertheless the photos and accompanying text provide a view of life in occupied Paris.
I visited Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris and was struck by the touching eulogies and the venom that still exists for those who collaborated. There is a picture in the book of young children who were deported under French authority to Auschwitz. The questions still remain to this day of who did this?
The pictures themselves are well worth the look. The author was a child during the occupation and he describes the suffering endured by the people of Paris. It is also important to note that France endured far less hardships than the countries of Eastern Europe.
I also feel the author minimizes the number of the French who embraced collaboration and its sordid aspects. After all, as he points out, it was the French police who isolated and rounded up the Jews. There were many French who admired the Nazis during the 1940 thru 1942 period. With the turning of the tide they became less visible and enthusiastic, but one should not minimize their participation. Nevertheless the photos and accompanying text provide a view of life in occupied Paris.
I visited Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris and was struck by the touching eulogies and the venom that still exists for those who collaborated. There is a picture in the book of young children who were deported under French authority to Auschwitz. The questions still remain to this day of who did this?
August 7, 2012
From Library Journal
Both general readers and students of history should hail the release of this timely book. Best-selling French author Perrault provides moving personal reminiscences of his childhood in occupied Paris. The brief but eloquent narrative is accompanied by hundreds of previously unpublished photos from French and German archives, collected and cataloged by Parisian art historian Azema. Together, text and photos present a graphic portrait of everyday life, recording daily human struggles to find food and fuel, the psychological warfare waged by the occupiers, and the methods of German economic exploitation. As artists, the authors place special emphasis on the arts under the occupation and document the heroism of the writers' resistance. In sum, they show how Paris "kept alive a sense of the enemy."-- Marie Marmo Mullaney, Caldwell Coll., N.J.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: French
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews