‘La France,’ as everyone knows, is female. Perhaps this is due to gendered assumptions about the beauty, cuisine and couture of the French capital, the symbolic revolutionary Marianne, or the patriarchal nature of language. Between 1940 and 1945, however, Paris was more literally female. Most of the capital’s men were serving with the Allied effort overseas, were POWs or forced workers in Germany. The women of Paris had stayed behind to keep the city running, put food on the table and care for their children, parents and in-laws. For some when France fell, Paris felt emasculated in another sense. Suddenly Parisian women found themselves having to decide how they were going to live alongside their almost entirely male Nazi conquerors and occupiers. French women were not yet enfranchised. Large numbers were housewives, and few had bank accounts. Ironically, for many it was when they were further disempowered as French citizens that they became empowered as women forced to make choices.
With this as her premise, Anne Sebba’s fascinating and beautifully written study gives voice to a myriad of narratives belonging to the Parisian women who resisted, collaborated, flourished, suffered, died or survived through a mixture of defiance and compromise. Their options were limited not only by Nazi ideology and French social expectation, but also by material need and the other perverting conditions that came with occupation. ‘C’est compliqué’ is a common refrain running through these pages. What was consistent was that the burden of decision fell on women.
To some, their choices seemed clear. Hélène de Portes, mistress of the prewar premier Paul Reynaud, was a fascist sympathiser who urged government ministers to negotiate with Nazi Germany. After the armistice, she left Paris in a car overloaded with trunks and cases.
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in