Nemirovsky's Novels in Demand

Irene Nemirovsky's Suite Francaise has sparked an interest in her previous novels.

This from Alan Riding of the New York Times:

"First published in France in 2004, it has sold 600,000 copies in French and close to 1 million more in 30 other languages. And predictably, a dozen of her earlier books have since been reissued and sold for translation.

Now another previously undiscovered Nemirovsky novel has been unearthed. A powerful tale of love, betrayal and death in a Burgundy village, "Chaleur du Sang" -- provisionally titled "Fire in the Blood" in English -- was published to warm reviews in Paris in March."

To read more of this article, go here.

Sally906's Review: SUITE FRANCAISE

Review: SUITE FRANCAISE - Irene Nemirovsky

Original review is here

Rated A

It is hard to know how to describe this book. Irene Nemirovsky was a Jewish woman who decided to write a novel based on her experiences as the Germans invaded France in WWII. Although a work of fiction - much of the scenes are based on fact. She was captured and died in Auschwitz concentration camp.

Originally meant to be a book in 5 parts she only wrote 2 prior to her capture. In the first part, Storm in June, she tells of the panicked exodus from Paris on the eve of the Nazi invasion. All classes of people pack up their belongings and flee, forced to rub shoulders in traffic-jams on the crowded roads south, some behaving with dignity, others with nauseating selfishness. Some die - some overcome dreadful situations and start to pick up their life again. Her description and observations just leave you breathless as she conjures up in your minds eye just how it must have been.

In part two, Dolce, she writes about some of the survivors from part one who are now in a small French village where Nazi soldiers are billeted, she describes how the German men were treated by the villagers, and concentrates on one young woman she tries to resist the attractions of a German officer, and takes the risk of defending a young farmer who joins the resistance.

The story ends in 1941 - the author never returned to write the end of her "Suite Francaise"

Read this book - it will be a great experience.

Laura's Review - Suite Francaise

Original Review

Irene Nemirovsky was an author of Jewish descent living in France in 1940. She initially intended for Suite Francaise to be a 5-part novel. Unfortunately, the war intervened. Nemirovsky completed two parts of the novel, and was then taken to Auschwitz where she died. Her daughters managed to hide the manuscript and it was published some 60 years later.What a fantastic book! The writing is wonderful. The first part takes place in 1940 when the Germans marched on Paris. It tells the stories of several different people who evacuated Paris, and what happened to them over the next several months. The characters range from the wealthy & famous to the ordinary. Each situation is one of personal tragedy, which is portrayed in poignant and realistic ways. The second part takes place in 1941, and describes the German occupation of a French village and the relationships that develop between soldiers and villagers. The characters introduced in this part have some connections to characters in the first part. Nemirovsky is superb at character development, and in her depiction of the French class system.The end of the book includes notes from Nemirovsky's notebook which show her creative process both in writing these first two volumes and in planning the third. It was interesting to read what she had planned for some characters who seemed ancillary in the first two parts. The final appendix contains correspondence, first from her and later, sadly, from her husband who attempts to locate her after she is taken away to the camp.

"Suite Française" by Irene Nemirovsky

"Suite Française" Irene Nemirovsky ****1/2

"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." (167)

It pleases me that my month was bracketed by two excellent French novels by authors I had never read before. At the same time, I am immeasurably saddened to find that both authors were cut off in the prime of their lives and the apex of their talent by events of world wars - Henri Alain-Fournier (author of Le Grand Meaulnes) in the battles of the first, and Nemirovsky in a concentration camp during the second. "Suite Française" is a an impossibly lucid (more light language! Time to expand my critical vocabulary.), detailed study of the occupation of France, written as the events were unfolding. The humanity of a broad cast of characters (broad on the scale of a Russian novel, showing the profound influence of Tolstoy on the Franco-Russian Nemirovsky) is underscored again and again, for good and for ill. German soldiers, living in French homes and requisitioning French property, are both eager to please and defensive about their actions. The upper classes (and particularly the upper middle class) come in for a scathing critique of their selfishness, but people from all walks of life manage to be alternately poisonous and self-sacrificing. Ideals like patriotism and piety have their roots in a profound selfishness. It is the details that scar and sear, a particularly striking feat since this novel remains unfinished and largely unedited by its author. In one nightmarish scene, a priest who agrees to take charge of a group of orphans from an institution under his family's patronage. They beat him to death after he leads them through the evacuation of Paris, and leave him mired in much on the grounds of a decayed estate.

Some other scathingly honest observations on the occupation:

On the French response to defeat -

"They feared a German victory, yet weren’t altogether happy at the idea that the English might win. All in all, they preferred everyone to be defeated." (270)

And, from the terrifying appendices of the book, which provide Nemirovsky's notes for the work as a whole and the correspondence that traces her family's struggle with occupation authorities who sent both Irene and her husband to their deaths in Nazi camps -

"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 realise she’s dead, their Republic, their freedom. They’re mourning her." (344)

[I have to note, at least tangentially, that this was the first eBook I have ever read in its entirety, and it was a laborious endeavor. It was very hard to maintain a rhythm of reading when you have to wait for the next page to load, or cannot see the whole page at once. I hadn't fully realize before how darting my reading style is - rather than proceeding methodically and linearly down the page, I frequently retrace my steps, reading a phrase here and there from different parts of the page. Don't ask how this makes for a coherent reading experience; I don't completely understand it myself.]


My original blog entry, which deals with a number of other books in addition to Suite Française, can be found here.

Suite Francaise - Book Review by Wendy

Suite Francaise, by Irene Nemirovsky
Original post of this review found here.
Submitted by Wendy

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.
-The Wine of Solitude- by Irene Nemirovsky for Irene Nemirovsky
-penciled at the top of the original first page of Suite Francaise-

Suite Francaise is an amazing piece of literature - a work in progress by a woman who lost her life in a German concentration camp before she could complete her masterpiece. Irene Nemirovsky had intended to write a 1000 page novel consisting of five parts: Storm in June, Dolce, Captivity, Battles, and Peace. Because of her untimely death at Auschwitz in August 1942, she drafted only the first two parts of the novel - a story with the promise of greatness. After turning the final page, I was left with the feeling of sorrow that we will never get to read Irene Nemirovsky's finished work.

Both Irene Nemirovksy and her husband died in Auschwitz. Their two children, hidden from the Nazi's by a family friend, survived the war - and in so doing, saved Irene's work, Suite Francaise, to be published 64 years after her death.

As a Jewish writer living with her husband and two children in France at the time of the Nazi occupation, Nemirovsky brings the reader a unique perspective of the war. She indicates in her notes a desire to write a novel not merely about history, but one with a greater depth of experience:

Never forget that the war will be over and that the entire historical sides will fade away. Try to create as much as possible: things, debates…that will interest people in 1952 or 2052.
-From the notes of Irene Nemirovsky, 2 June 1942-

Nemirovsky's writing is beautiful. She captures a sense of place and time with ease. Her descriptions of nature seem almost surreal when contrasted with the reality of war:

It was an exquisite evening with clear skies and blue shadows; the last rays of the setting sun caressed the roses, while the church bells called the faithful to prayer. But then a noise rose up from the road, a noise unlike any they'd heard these past few days, a low, steady rumbling that seemed to move slowly closer, heavy and relentless. Trucks were heading towards the village. This time it really was the Germans. -From Suite Francaise, page 92-93-

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. -From Suite Francaise, page 167-

The novel opens with Book I (Storm in June) on the eve of the Nazi invasion of France. Nemirovsky introduces a cast of characters who include a writer, a priest, a family of the upper class, a working class couple - all fleeing Paris. They have lives which seem parallel to each other, and yet their stories intersect in surprising ways.

In spite of everything, the thing that links all these people together is our times, solely our times.
-From Irene Nemirovsky's notes, 24 April 1942-

The contrast between the rich upper classes and the poor or less fortunate, is stark. We know from the author's meticulous notes that this is intentional:

If I want to create something striking, it is not misery I will show but the prosperity that contrasts with it. -From Irene Nemirovsky's notes, 30 June 1941-

Nemirovsky deftly shows these class differences between characters and how this impacts relationships:

What separates or unites people is not their language, their laws, their customs, their principles, but the way they hold their knife and fork. -From Suite Francaise, page 291-

In Book II (Dolce), the setting is a French village which has just become occupied by the Germans. It is here that Nemirovsky's novel begins to soar as she weaves together the stories of the people - the Mayor and his snotty wife, the farmers, the women who are mourning the loss of sons and husbands, and the soldiers. Amazingly, given that Nemirovsky wrote this novel as the war was unfurling and she was being victimized by the Nazis, she portrays the German soldiers without hatred or malice. With honesty and skill, she deconstructs the idea of the Nazi invader - revealing men with the capacity to think and feel as all humans do.

In the heart of every man and every woman a kind of Garden of Eden endures, where there is no war, no death, where wild animals and deer live together in peace. -From Suite Francaise, page 321-

Although Suite Francaise is a novel - a piece of fiction - it trembles with a sense of truth; an almost autobiographical feel that I could not shake and which touched me deeply. There were moments when the reality of Nemirovsky's life resonated within the pages of her book.

He wrote with a chewed-up pencil stub, in a little notebook which he hid against his heart. He felt he had to hurry: something inside him was making him anxious, was knocking on an invisible door. By writing, he opened that door, he gave life to something that wished to be born. Then suddenly, he would become discouraged, feel disheartened, weary. He was mad. What was he doing writing these stupid stories, letting himself be pampered by the farmer's wife, while his friends were in prison, his despairing parents though he was dead, when the future was so uncertain and the past so bleak?
-From Suite Francaise, page 179-

There is no doubt that had Irene Nemirovsky survived the war, she would have gone on to polish and finish her book. She established herself as a writer of exceptional quality having already published her highly acclaimed novel David Golder. Suite Francaise is an important story which deserves to be read and savored. It is heartbreaking to read the author's notes, as well as the frenzied communications shared between her husband and friends following her arrest. Irene Nemirovsky writes in her notes dated 1 July 1942, only days before her deportation to a Nazi concentration camp:

What lives on:

1. Our humble day-to-day lives
2. Art
3. God

By reading Suite Francaise, we insure that her art lives on.