Daniel Hahn

Laws that changed the world

Before the Nuremberg Trials, neither genocide nor crimes against humanity were recognised concepts. In his moving East West Street, Philippe Sands describes their origins (within his own family) and their inspiration

issue 21 May 2016

One of the things Philippe Sands clearly remembers from his grandparents’ Paris apartment — a rather sombre, silent place — is the lack of family photographs. There’s a single, framed, unsmiling wedding photo, and that’s all. There is no mood of bittersweet nostalgia, there are no nods to memory or history.

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