Wartime Jewish writer's novel discovered and published

From The Australian February 27, 2006 by Matthew Campbell . . .

An unearthed novel sparks French introspection on the Occupation.

. .."It is the sort of thing that only ever happens once in a publisher's life," said Rubinstein last week, describing the text written in German-occupied France by a Jewish novelist shortly before she was sent to her death at Auschwitz in 1942. Irene Nemirovsky's manuscript, written in tiny letters to save paper, had been kept in a battered suitcase for six decades before being transcribed by her daughter and posted to Rubinstein's office in 2004.

It will be published in Britain this week and if the book's success elsewhere is anything to go by it is certain to be the toast of publisher Chatto & Windus. Suite Francaise, which evokes the heroism, brutality and cowardice of a country under occupation, has been translated into 30 languages and is about to be reissued in paperback in France, where it has sold more than 350,000 copies and won a prestigious literary prize.

It has also fed a national mood of introspection, contributing to a debate on the darkest chapters of French history and focusing on what one reviewer described as the billion-euro question about collaboration with the Nazis. "Placed today in the same conditions as then," wrote the critic, "would we be better, more united, less cowardly, less spontaneously collaborative? Nothing is less certain."

. . .Nemirovsky was 16 when her parents fled the Russian Revolution. She married a rich Russian exile, began writing and by 1929 was hailed as a budding talent. Her friends abandoned her, however, after the German invasion, when Jews were forced to wear the yellow Star of David.

She started work on the epic Suite Francaise, which follows several prosperous and influential families fleeing advancing German troops, graphically evoking the chaotic exodus from Paris.
.. . she succumbed to typhus at the age of 39 after only weeks at Auschwitz.

Just as remarkable is the story of the manuscript's survival, through three years on the run from the Gestapo, several house moves and a flood. French radio presenters have been heard weeping into their microphones while listening to Denise Epstein, the author's 75-year-old daughter, describing her mother's arrest. "When they came for her there were no tears," said Epstein. "It was a silent adieu. She asked me to look after papa. I am sure she knew she was leaving forever."

Epstein, then 13, was left clutching the suitcase containing photographs and papers that her mother had entrusted to her on the day of her arrest. After her father was also marched away to Auschwitz, where he died in the gas chambers, Epstein and Elisabeth, her five-year-old sister, were cared for by a governess who moved them between safe houses.

. . .The suitcase was the sisters' only link with the past but the manuscript in microscopic handwriting looked like a diary and the women could not bear the thought of reading their mother's last words. "In 1975 I opened the manuscript," said Epstein, "but I found it too painful to read and closed it again." A flood in her apartment some years later prompted her to think about safeguarding the documents. Using a magnifying glass, she began to transcribe what she thought was a diary, only to discover that it was a novel.

Seeing the book published, Epstein said she felt relieved of a great weight. "I am sure my mother is happy. I understand now the point of my own survival," she said.

The Sunday Times