Suite Francaise Part 31

* Irene Nemirovsky's husband. Like her, a refugee who fled Russia during the Bolshevik Revolution to live in Paris, where he was a bank manager at the Banque des Pays du Nord. (Editor) Irene Nemirovsky's husband. Like her, a refugee who fled Russia during the Bolshevik Revolution to live in Paris, where he was a bank manager at the Banque des Pays du Nord. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Director of Albin Michel Publishers and son-in-law of Albin Michel who, at this time, no longer managed the publishing house alone for health reasons. (Editor) Director of Albin Michel Publishers and son-in-law of Albin Michel who, at this time, no longer managed the publishing house alone for health reasons. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Robert Esmenard's secretary. (Editor) Robert Esmenard's secretary. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Both newspapers which published Irene Nemirovsky's works. Both newspapers which published Irene Nemirovsky's works. Return to text. Return to text.

* The sections quoted here are Articles 1 and 3 of this law. It immediately followed the famous law of 3 October 1940 which "excluded Jews from elected bodies, from positions of responsibility in the civil service, judiciary, and military services, and from positions influencing cultural life (teaching in public schools, newspaper reporting or editing, direction of films or radio programmes)." It also defined "Jews racially as anyone with three Jewish grandparents, whatever the religion of the present generation." See Robert O. Paxton, The sections quoted here are Articles 1 and 3 of this law. It immediately followed the famous law of 3 October 1940 which "excluded Jews from elected bodies, from positions of responsibility in the civil service, judiciary, and military services, and from positions influencing cultural life (teaching in public schools, newspaper reporting or editing, direction of films or radio programmes)." It also defined "Jews racially as anyone with three Jewish grandparents, whatever the religion of the present generation." See Robert O. Paxton, Vichy France, Vichy France, pp. 1745. pp. 1745. Return to text. Return to text.

* France is divided into regions known as France is divided into regions known as departements departements, similar to the British counties. These in turn are subdivided into cantons and communes. Each department has a central government representative called the Prefet, Prefet, with several with several Sous-Prefets Sous-Prefets in the cantons. Note that a distinction is being made between foreign Jews and French Jews. French Jews believed they would remain exempt from such laws. Irene Nemirovsky was never granted French citizenship. in the cantons. Note that a distinction is being made between foreign Jews and French Jews. French Jews believed they would remain exempt from such laws. Irene Nemirovsky was never granted French citizenship. Return to text. Return to text.

* Madeleine Cabour, born Avot, was a great friend of Irene Nemirovsky, with whom she corresponded regularly as a young girl. After the war, her brother, Rene Avot, took care of Elisabeth Nemirovsky when the legal guardian of the two girls went to the United States. Elisabeth lived with his family until she came of age. (Editor) Madeleine Cabour, born Avot, was a great friend of Irene Nemirovsky, with whom she corresponded regularly as a young girl. After the war, her brother, Rene Avot, took care of Elisabeth Nemirovsky when the legal guardian of the two girls went to the United States. Elisabeth lived with his family until she came of age. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Since the department of Saone-et-Loire was divided by the demarcation line, it was the Since the department of Saone-et-Loire was divided by the demarcation line, it was the Sous-Prefet Sous-Prefet who took the place of the who took the place of the Prefet Prefet in the occupied section, where the village of Issy-l'Eveque was located. in the occupied section, where the village of Issy-l'Eveque was located. Return to text. Return to text.

* Literary Director of Albin Michel Publishers. (Editor) Literary Director of Albin Michel Publishers. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Reference to the Free Zone and the Occupied Zone. Reference to the Free Zone and the Occupied Zone. Return to text. Return to text.

* Irene Nemirovsky and her husband, Michel Epstein, had brought Julie Dumot to Issy-l'eveque in case they were arrested. She had been the live-in companion of the children's maternal grandparents. (Editor) Irene Nemirovsky and her husband, Michel Epstein, had brought Julie Dumot to Issy-l'eveque in case they were arrested. She had been the live-in companion of the children's maternal grandparents. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* This work was actually written by Irene Nemirovsky and was published in instalments in the newspaper This work was actually written by Irene Nemirovsky and was published in instalments in the newspaper Gringoire Gringoire in 1941 without mentioning the author's name. Published in novel form in 1947 by Albin Michel with Irene Nemirovsky as author. in 1941 without mentioning the author's name. Published in novel form in 1947 by Albin Michel with Irene Nemirovsky as author. Return to text. Return to text.

* Pithiviers, near Orleans, was one of the infamous concentration camps where children were separated from their parents and imprisoned, while the adults were processed and deported to camps further away, usually Auschwitz. Pithiviers, near Orleans, was one of the infamous concentration camps where children were separated from their parents and imprisoned, while the adults were processed and deported to camps further away, usually Auschwitz. Return to text. Return to text.

* The first letter was undoubtedly generously pa.s.sed on by a policeman and the second by someone she met at the Pithiviers train station. (Editor) The first letter was undoubtedly generously pa.s.sed on by a policeman and the second by someone she met at the Pithiviers train station. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* A Red Cross intermediary. (Editor) A Red Cross intermediary. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Great-uncle of Denise and Elisabeth Epstein. (Editor) Great-uncle of Denise and Elisabeth Epstein. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* The content of this letter implies he is talking about Jacques Benoist-Mechin. (Editor) The content of this letter implies he is talking about Jacques Benoist-Mechin. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* O.U. 1 July 1941. Comrades. We lived with the Epstein family for a long time and got to know them and they are a very respectable and obliging family. We therefore ask you to treat them accordingly. Heil Hitler! O.U. 1 July 1941. Comrades. We lived with the Epstein family for a long time and got to know them and they are a very respectable and obliging family. We therefore ask you to treat them accordingly. Heil Hitler! Return to text. Return to text.

* Count Rene de Chambrun was a lawyer and son-in-law of Pierre Laval, whose only daughter, Josee, he married. (Editor) Count Rene de Chambrun was a lawyer and son-in-law of Pierre Laval, whose only daughter, Josee, he married. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* For translation, see note 18 on p. 369. For translation, see note 18 on p. 369. Return to text. Return to text.

* Paul Morand was a French writer and diplomat who retained his post under the Vichy government. In 1958 he was refused entry into the Academie Francaise but was eventually admitted in 1968. Paul Morand was a French writer and diplomat who retained his post under the Vichy government. In 1958 he was refused entry into the Academie Francaise but was eventually admitted in 1968. Return to text. Return to text.

* This novel appeared in instalments in This novel appeared in instalments in Gringoire Gringoire beginning in May 1939. It was published in 2005 by editions Denoel under the t.i.tle beginning in May 1939. It was published in 2005 by editions Denoel under the t.i.tle Le Maitre des ames. Le Maitre des ames. Return to text. Return to text.

* Concentration camp to the north-east of Paris. Concentration camp to the north-east of Paris. Return to text. Return to text.

* Michel Epstein's sister; she would be arrested and deported to Auschwitz. (Editor) Michel Epstein's sister; she would be arrested and deported to Auschwitz. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* A French friend of Samuel Epstein, Michel Epstein's older brother. (Editor) A French friend of Samuel Epstein, Michel Epstein's older brother. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Irene Nemirovsky's maid. (Editor) Irene Nemirovsky's maid. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* President of the Red Cross. (Editor) President of the Red Cross. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

*Wife of Paul Morand, but to be safe, it was necessary to use ambiguous names. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* A Romanian bishop prince who often came to see Irene. (Editor) A Romanian bishop prince who often came to see Irene. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Age thirteen to fourteen. Age thirteen to fourteen. Return to text. Return to text.

* Age eight to nine. Age eight to nine. Return to text. Return to text.

* Mme Jean-Jacques Bernard, wife of the writer Jean-Jacques Bernard, son of [the writer] Tristan Bernard. (Editor) Mme Jean-Jacques Bernard, wife of the writer Jean-Jacques Bernard, son of [the writer] Tristan Bernard. (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

* Banque de l'Union Europeenne (formerly the Banque des Pays du Nord where Michel Epstein was Manager). (Editor) Banque de l'Union Europeenne (formerly the Banque des Pays du Nord where Michel Epstein was Manager). (Editor) Return to text. Return to text.

Preface to the French Edition

* This is an edited version of the preface that appeared in the French edition of This is an edited version of the preface that appeared in the French edition of Suite Francaise Suite Francaise published by editions Denoel in 2004. published by editions Denoel in 2004. Return to text. Return to text.

* The infirmary at Auschwitz where prisoners who were too ill to work were confined in atrocious conditions. The SS would periodically pile them into trucks and take them to the gas chambers. The infirmary at Auschwitz where prisoners who were too ill to work were confined in atrocious conditions. The SS would periodically pile them into trucks and take them to the gas chambers. Return to text. Return to text.

Preface to the French Edition*1

In 1929 the French publisher Bernard Gra.s.set was so enthusiastic about a ma.n.u.script he had received in the post that he immediately decided to publish it. It was only as he was about to send a contract to the author of the novel, ent.i.tled David Golder, David Golder, that he realised no name or address had been given-just a post office box number. He put an advertis.e.m.e.nt in the newspapers asking the mysterious author to make contact. that he realised no name or address had been given-just a post office box number. He put an advertis.e.m.e.nt in the newspapers asking the mysterious author to make contact.

When Irene Nemirovsky arrived to meet him a few days later, Bernard Gra.s.set was astonished: how could this fashionable, cheerful young Russian woman, who had lived in France for only ten years, have written a book that was so brilliantly daring, cruel, and mature? He questioned her carefully to make sure she wasn't standing in for a famous author who wished to remain anonymous, but as he did so his admiration grew. Her French was impeccable (although born in Kiev, she had learned it from her governess); as well as Russian, she knew Polish, Basque, English, Finnish and a little Yiddish (a language she would make use of in her novel Les Chiens et les Loups, Les Chiens et les Loups, published in 1940). published in 1940).

David Golder was an overnight success, unanimously acclaimed by the critics and admired by other writers. However, the twenty-six-year-old Irene Nemirovsky refused to be carried away by her sensational entry into the literary world. She was surprised that so much fuss was made over was an overnight success, unanimously acclaimed by the critics and admired by other writers. However, the twenty-six-year-old Irene Nemirovsky refused to be carried away by her sensational entry into the literary world. She was surprised that so much fuss was made over David Golder, David Golder, which she considered, without false modesty, a "minor novel." On 22 January 1930 she wrote to a friend, "How could you think I could possibly forget my old friends because of a little book which people have been talking about for a few weeks and which will be forgotten just as quickly, just as everything is forgotten in Paris?" which she considered, without false modesty, a "minor novel." On 22 January 1930 she wrote to a friend, "How could you think I could possibly forget my old friends because of a little book which people have been talking about for a few weeks and which will be forgotten just as quickly, just as everything is forgotten in Paris?"

Irene Nemirovsky was born 1903 in Kiev, then part of the area known as Yiddishland to which Russian Jews were confined. Her father's family came from the Ukrainian city of Nemirov, which had been an important centre of the Ha.s.sidic movement in the eighteenth century. Leon Nemirovsky had the misfortune to be born in 1868 in Elisabethgrad, the city where the great waves of pogroms against the Jews began in 1881. However, his family had prospered, becoming wealthy by trading in grain. As a young man Leon had travelled widely before making his fortune in finance, going on to become one of the richest bankers in Russia. His business cards read, "Leon Nemirovsky, President and Managing Director of the Bank of Commerce of Vorononej, Administrator of the Union Bank of Moscow, Member of the Private Commercial Banking Committee of Petrograd." He bought an enormous private house overlooking St. Petersburg, on a quiet street lined with gardens and lime trees.

Irene was not a happy child. Her mother, who liked to be called f.a.n.n.y (after her Hebrew name, Faiga), saw the birth of her daughter as the first sign of her declining youth and beauty. She felt a kind of aversion to Irene, for whom she never showed the least sign of love, and would spend hours in front of the mirror pampering herself, or away from home in search of extramarital affairs. She could not bear the idea that her looks would fade, or that she might turn into the kind of older woman who kept young men. She forced Irene to dress like a schoolgirl well into her teens in order to convince herself that she wasn't growing older.

Leon, whom Irene adored and admired, was always busy with his work and most of the time was away, or betting large sums of money at the casino. A lonely, solitary child, entrusted to the care of her governess, Irene took refuge in books, and fought off despair by developing a ferocious hatred of her mother. This violent and unnatural relationship between mother and daughter would be at the heart of many of her novels, as would her disdain for her mother's wealthy Jewish milieu.

In Russia the Nemirovskys led a life of luxury. Every summer they would leave the Ukraine for the Crimean coast, Biarritz, Saint-Jean-de-Luz, Hendaye or the French Riviera. Irene's mother would take up residence in a villa, while Irene and her governess were sent to lodge with a family. At fourteen, after the death of her French teacher, Irene began writing. Settled on the sofa, a notebook on her lap, she developed a technique inspired by Ivan Turgenev. As well as the narrative itself, she would write down all the ideas the story inspired in her, without any revision or crossing out. She filled notebook upon notebook with thoughts about her characters, even the minor ones, describing their appearance, their education, their childhood, all the stages of their lives in chronological order. When each character had been detailed to this degree of precision, she would use two pencils, one red, the other blue, to underline the essential characteristics to be retained; sometimes only a few lines. She would then move quickly on to writing the novel, improving it, then editing the final version.

In 1917, the Nemirovskys were still living in the large, beautiful house in St. Petersburg they had occupied since 1914. Nemirovsky described the house in her autobiographical novel Le Vin de solitude Le Vin de solitude: "The apartment . . . was built in such a way that from the entrance hall, you could see all the way back to the other rooms-a series of white and gold reception rooms that were visible through the large, open doors." For a number of Russian writers and poets, St. Petersburg is a mythical city; to Irene Nemirovsky it was nothing more than a collection of dark, snow-covered streets, swept by the icy wind that rose from the disgusting, polluted ca.n.a.ls of the Neva. When the October Revolution broke out, Leon Nemirovsky thought it expedient to move his family to Moscow since he frequently went there on business and had sub-let an apartment from an officer of the Imperial Guard who had been a.s.signed to the Russian emba.s.sy in London. His plan proved misguided. Moscow was where the more violent fighting took place and the family were trapped in the apartment for five days, their only food a bag of potatoes, some chocolate and sardines. Wedged in between other apartment blocks and surrounded by a courtyard, the house was hidden from the street. While battles raged outside, Irene explored the officer's library. There she discovered Huysmans, de Maupa.s.sant, Plato and Oscar Wilde (The Portrait of Dorian Gray was her favourite book). When the street was deserted she would quietly go down to pick up the empty cartridges. was her favourite book). When the street was deserted she would quietly go down to pick up the empty cartridges.

During a lull in the fighting, the Nemirovskys went back to St. Petersburg, but the Bolsheviks had put a price on Leon's head and he was forced into hiding. In December 1917, taking advantage of the fact that the borders had not yet been closed, Leon Nemirovsky made arrangements for his family to travel to Finland, disguised as peasants. Irene spent a year in a little hamlet consisting of three wooden houses in the middle of a snowfield. She still hoped to return to Russia and the wait seemed long. While they were there, her father returned to Russia several times in disguise to try and rescue their belongings. Yet despite the uncertainty and lack of comfort, Nemirovsky experienced for the first time a period of serenity and peace. She was absorbed by her writing, composing prose poems inspired by Oscar Wilde.

With the situation in Russia deteriorating and the Bolsheviks drawing dangerously nearer to them, the Nemirovskys moved on to Sweden, finally reaching Stockholm after a long journey. They spent three months in the Swedish capital, where Irene would always remember the mauve lilacs growing in the courtyards and gardens. Then, in early 1919, the family took a small cargo boat for France, sailing for ten days through a terrible storm, which inspired the dramatic final scene in David Golder David Golder. Safe in Paris, Leon Nemirovsky took over as director of a branch of his bank and so managed to rebuild his fortune.

Irene had always loved France and, in Paris, her life changed utterly. She enrolled at the Sorbonne, where she graduated with a distinction in literature, and began sending stories to magazines. In 1927 she published a novella called L'Enfant genial, L'Enfant genial, about a young Jewish boy from the slums of Odessa who seduces an aristocrat with his poetry. about a young Jewish boy from the slums of Odessa who seduces an aristocrat with his poetry.

The Nemirovskys were soon a.s.similated into French society and led the glamorous life of the wealthy upper-middle cla.s.s: fashionable soirees, champagne dinners, b.a.l.l.s, luxurious holidays. Irene adored dancing. She dashed between parties, living, as she herself admitted, "the high life." Sometimes she gambled at the casino. On 2 January 1924 she wrote to a friend, "I have had the wildest week: one ball after another, and I'm still a bit heady and finding it difficult to get back into the routine of work . . ." Another time she wrote from Nice, "I'm behaving like a madwoman, it's shameful. I dance all night long. Every evening there are very chic entertainments in different hotels, and as my lucky star has blessed me with a few handsome young men, I'm enjoying myself very much indeed." A further letter, written just after a return from Nice, reads: "I haven't behaved very well . . . for a change . . . The evening before I left, there was a grand ball at our hotel, the Negresco. I danced like a mad thing until 2 a.m. and went outside in the freezing cold to drink champagne and flirt." A few days later she wrote: "Choura came to see me and lectured me for two hours: it seems that I flirt too much, that it's bad to upset boys like that . . . I broke off with Henry, you know, and he came to see me the other day looking pale, wide-eyed and evil, with a revolver in his pocket!"

In the whirlwind of one of these parties she met Mikhail-Michel Epstein-"a small dark-haired man with a very swarthy complexion," who wasted no time in courting her. He had a degree in Physical and Electronic Engineering from the University of St. Petersburg, and worked as a senior banking executive at the Banque des Pays du Nord, Rue Gaillon. She liked him, flirted and, in 1926, they were married. They moved to 10 avenue Constant-Coquelin, a beautiful apartment on the Left Bank, whose windows looked out over the large courtyard of a convent. In 1929 Irene gave birth to Denise (f.a.n.n.y sent a teddy bear). By the time her second daughter, Elisabeth, was born in 1937, David Golder David Golder had been turned into a film, and she had published nine novels. She and Michel moved in high circles and took holidays in fashionable spa towns for Irene's asthma. had been turned into a film, and she had published nine novels. She and Michel moved in high circles and took holidays in fashionable spa towns for Irene's asthma.

In spite of her fame, and though clearly very attached to her new country, Irene still didn't have French citizenship. In 1939 Irene decided that she and her children should convert to Catholicism. This decision should be seen in the context of the obsessive fear of war in 1939, and the previous decade of violent anti-Semitism during which Jews had been portrayed as evil invaders and power-hungry warmongers-a race of bourgeois merchants and revolutionaries. She and her family were baptised early in the morning of 2 February 1939 in the Chapel of Sainte-Marie in Paris, by a family friend, Prince Ghika, a Romanian bishop.

When war broke out in September, Irene and Michel took their two small daughters, Denise and Elisabeth, to the safety of Issy-l'Eveque, in Saone-et-Loire, the village where their nanny, Cecile Michaud, came from. There, they were left in the care of Cecile's mother, Madam Mitaine.

For the first months of the war, Irene and Michel stayed in Paris, making frequent journeys to visit their children. Then, in June 1940, the Germans occupied Paris and the Nemirovskys decided to leave Paris altogether, taking up residence in a hotel opposite the house of Cecile Michaud, the Hotel des Voyageurs. From then on life became increasingly difficult. On 3 October 1940, a law was pa.s.sed giving Jews inferior legal and social standing. Most important, it defined, based on racial criteria, who was to be considered Jewish in the French State. The Nemirovskys, who took part in an enforced census in June 1941, were both Jewish and foreign: their baptism certificates were useless. Michel no longer had the right to work at the bank; the publishing houses were "Aryanising" their personnel and authors, so Irene could no longer be published. Further race laws pa.s.sed in October 1940 and June 1941 stipulated that Jews could be placed under house arrest or deported and interned in concentration camps. Issy-l'Eveque was now in the occupied zone and the Hotel des Voyageurs was full of German soldiers. Irene, her husband and her daughters all openly wore the Jewish star.

Irene Nemirovsky watched what was happening with pitiless clarity: she had no doubt that these events would result in tragedy. But life went on. Denise celebrated her first Communion, despite going to the local school with the Jewish star sewn prominently on to the front of her coat. Michel amused himself by writing a multiplication table for Denise in rhyme. The family were finally able to find a large house to rent. Irene read and wrote constantly. Every day, after breakfast, she would go out, sometimes walking for ten kilometres before finding a spot she liked. Then she would start working. Between 1940 and 1942, the publishing house Albin Michel and the director of the anti-Semitic newspaper Gringoire Gringoire agreed to help her publish her short stories under various pseudonyms. She also wrote a life of Chekhov and a novel, agreed to help her publish her short stories under various pseudonyms. She also wrote a life of Chekhov and a novel, Les Feux de l'automne, Les Feux de l'automne, which would not be published until 1957. But, most important, in 1941 she started work on an ambitious novel to be called which would not be published until 1957. But, most important, in 1941 she started work on an ambitious novel to be called Suite Francaise Suite Francaise.

Nemirovsky began Suite Francaise, Suite Francaise, as was her habit, by writing notes on the work in progress and thoughts inspired by the situation in France. She created a list of characters, both major and minor, then checked that she had used them correctly. She dreamed of a book of a thousand pages, constructed like a symphony, but in five sections, according to rhythm and tone. She took Beethoven's Fifth Symphony as a model. as was her habit, by writing notes on the work in progress and thoughts inspired by the situation in France. She created a list of characters, both major and minor, then checked that she had used them correctly. She dreamed of a book of a thousand pages, constructed like a symphony, but in five sections, according to rhythm and tone. 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 work on her book, simultaneously writing notes. She called these lucid, cynical remarks Notes sur l'etat de France Notes sur l'etat de France ( (Notes on the State of France). They prove that she had absolutely no illusions, not about the att.i.tude of the inert French ma.s.ses-"loathsome" in their defeat and collaboration-nor about her own fate. As she wrote at the top of the first page:

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

In her writing she denounced fear, cowardice, acceptance of humiliation, of persecution and ma.s.sacre. She was alone. It was rare to find anyone in the literary and publishing worlds who did not choose to collaborate with the n.a.z.is. Every day, Irene would go to meet the postman, but there were increasingly few letters from her publishers. She did not try to escape her fate by fleeing-to Switzerland for example, which was taking in a small number of Jews coming from France, especially women and children. She saw the situation in such bleak terms that on 3 June she wrote her Will and gave it to the children's governess, asking that she take care of Denise and Elisabeth if necessary. She gave precise instructions, listing all the possessions she had managed to save, which could be sold to provide money to pay the rent, heat the house, buy a stove, hire a gardener who would tend the vegetable garden to provide food while rationing lasted; she provided the addresses of her daughters' doctors, and details of their diet. Not a word of revolt. A straightforward understanding of the situation exactly as it was-hopeless.

On 3 July she wrote, "Just let it be over-one way or the other!" She saw the situation as a succession of violent shocks that could kill her.

On 11 July she was working in the pine forest, sitting on her blue cardigan "in the middle of an ocean of rotting leaves drenched by last night's storm, as if on a raft, my legs folded beneath me." That day she wrote a letter to her editor at Albin Michel that left no doubt about her certainty that she would not survive the war: "My dear friend . . . think of me sometimes. I have done a lot of writing. I suppose they will be posthumous works, but it helps pa.s.s the time."

On 13 July 1942, the French police knocked at the Nemirovskys' door. They had come to arrest Irene. On 16 July, she was interned in the concentration camp at Pithiviers in the Loiret region. The next day she was deported to Auschwitz in Convoy number 6. She was registered at the extermination camp at Birkenau, and as she was very weak, was sent to the Revier.*2 She died on 17 August 1942. She died on 17 August 1942.

When Irene was taken away, Michel did not understand that to be arrested and deported meant certain death. Every day he expected her to come home and insisted, at mealtimes, that her place be set at the table. In complete despair, he wrote to Marshal Petain to explain that his wife had a delicate const.i.tution and to request permission to take her place in the labour camp.

In October 1942, the Vichy government responded by arresting him. He was first imprisoned at Creusot, then Drancy, where his search doc.u.ment shows that 8,500 francs were taken from him. On 6 November 1942, he too was deported to Auschwitz and was sent straight to the gas chamber.

Immediately after arresting Michel Epstein, the police went to the village school to get Denise, but her schoolteacher hid her behind her bed. The police did not give up and continued their hunt. The Nemirovskys' governess had the presence of mind to remove the Jewish star from their clothes and flee the village with the little girls. They spent the rest of the war moving between hiding places. The first was a Catholic boarding school, where two of the nuns knew the little girls were Jewish. There Denise was given a false name but she never managed to get used to it, so she was often scolded in cla.s.s because she didn't reply when she was called. But the French police-who it seems had little better to do than hunt down two children so they might share the same fate as their parents-picked up their trail. The girls were forced to leave the convent to hide out in a series of cellars in the region of Bordeaux. Whenever they boarded a train to move on, the governess would tell Denise to hide her nose. When Denise caught a chest infection, the people who were hiding her didn't help her to see a doctor.

The war over, the two girls returned to Paris and went to their grandmother's house to ask for help. f.a.n.n.y had spent the war years in Nice, living in great comfort, but when the children rang the doorbell she refused to let them in, shouting through the closed door that if their parents were dead they should go to an orphanage. (f.a.n.n.y died in 1972, in a large apartment in Paris on the avenue President Wilson. The only things found in her safe were two books by her daughter: Jezebel Jezebel and and David Golder David Golder.) Each day, wearing a sign with their names written on it, Denise and Elisabeth would make their way to the platform of the Gare de l'Est, where trains carrying the survivors of the concentration camps were beginning to arrive. They would also go to the Hotel Lutetia, which had been turned into a reception centre for returning deportees-once, Denise began to run down the street after a woman because she thought she recognised her mother-but eventually it became clear that their parents were not coming back.

That the ma.n.u.script of Suite Francaise Suite Francaise should have survived in such circ.u.mstances is extraordinary. It was Denise who put it into a suitcase as she and her sister fled Issy l'Eveque. She had often watched her mother writing-in tiny handwriting to save ink and paper-in the large leatherbound notebook. She took it as a memento of her mother. The suitcase accompanied Denise and Elisabeth from one precarious hiding place to another. After the war, they couldn't bring themselves to read the notebook-having it was enough. Once, Denise tried to look inside to see what was there, but it was too painful. Many years pa.s.sed, and she and her sister, Elisabeth, who had become an editor in a publishing house under the name Elisabeth Gille, agreed they should entrust their mother's notebook to the Inst.i.tut Memoires de l'edition contemporaine, an organisation dedicated to doc.u.menting memories of the war, in order to preserve it. Before giving it up, Denise decided to type it out. With the help of a large magnifying gla.s.s, she began the long, difficult task of deciphering the minuscule handwriting. Soon she discovered that these were not simply notes or a private diary, as she had thought, but a violent masterpiece, a fresco of extraordinary lucidity, a vivid snapshot of France and the French-spineless, defeated and occupied: here was the exodus from Paris; villages invaded by exhausted, hungry women and children battling to find a place to sleep, if only a chair in a country inn; cars piled high with furniture, mattresses and pots and pans, running out of petrol and left abandoned in the roads; the rich trying to save their precious jewels; a German soldier falling in love with a French woman under the watchful eye of her mother-in-law; the simple dignity of a modest couple searching amidst the chaos of the convoys fleeing Paris for a trace of their wounded son . . . should have survived in such circ.u.mstances is extraordinary. It was Denise who put it into a suitcase as she and her sister fled Issy l'Eveque. She had often watched her mother writing-in tiny handwriting to save ink and paper-in the large leatherbound notebook. She took it as a memento of her mother. The suitcase accompanied Denise and Elisabeth from one precarious hiding place to another. After the war, they couldn't bring themselves to read the notebook-having it was enough. Once, Denise tried to look inside to see what was there, but it was too painful. Many years pa.s.sed, and she and her sister, Elisabeth, who had become an editor in a publishing house under the name Elisabeth Gille, agreed they should entrust their mother's notebook to the Inst.i.tut Memoires de l'edition contemporaine, an organisation dedicated to doc.u.menting memories of the war, in order to preserve it. Before giving it up, Denise decided to type it out. With the help of a large magnifying gla.s.s, she began the long, difficult task of deciphering the minuscule handwriting. Soon she discovered that these were not simply notes or a private diary, as she had thought, but a violent masterpiece, a fresco of extraordinary lucidity, a vivid snapshot of France and the French-spineless, defeated and occupied: here was the exodus from Paris; villages invaded by exhausted, hungry women and children battling to find a place to sleep, if only a chair in a country inn; cars piled high with furniture, mattresses and pots and pans, running out of petrol and left abandoned in the roads; the rich trying to save their precious jewels; a German soldier falling in love with a French woman under the watchful eye of her mother-in-law; the simple dignity of a modest couple searching amidst the chaos of the convoys fleeing Paris for a trace of their wounded son . . .

Denise Epstein sent the ma.n.u.script to the publisher Denoel. Sixty-four years after Nemirovsky's death, we are finally able to read the last work of a writer who had held a mirror up to France at its darkest hour.

When Denise Epstein entrusted the ma.n.u.script of Suite Francaise Suite Francaise to the archives, she felt tremendous sadness that her sister Elisabeth Gille, who died in 1996, had not been able to read it. Elisabeth had, herself, written to the archives, she felt tremendous sadness that her sister Elisabeth Gille, who died in 1996, had not been able to read it. Elisabeth had, herself, written Le Mirador Le Mirador ( (The Watchtower): a magnificent imagined biography of the mother she never had the chance to know. She was only five years old when Irene Nemirovsky died in Auschwitz.

-MYRIAM ANISSIMOV

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.

My thanks go to Olivier Rubinstein and everyone at editions Denoel who welcomed this ma.n.u.script with enthusiasm and emotion; to Francis Esmenard, President and General Director of Albin Michel, who showed great generosity in allowing the publication of a piece of the past of which he was the guardian; to Myriam Anissimov, the link between Romain Gary, Olivier Rubinstein and Irene Nemirovsky; and to Jean-Luc Pidoux-Payot, who helped read the ma.n.u.script and gave me his valuable advice.

-DENISE EPSTEIN