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hzb333's review against another edition
4.0
This book is really interesting. I've read a lot about the Nazi occupation of Paris (it was my concentration in college) but not a lot about the culture. This book breaks things down into each concentration painting, music, ballet, etc... and discusses how each group worked with and against the nazis, hid Jews, and survived the occupation.
evamadera1's review
informative
slow-paced
3.0
I had high hopes for this book, finding the concept elaborated upon in the subtitle incredibly intriguing. Unfortunately, Riding packed this book so densely with names and titles of artistic works that if I had attempted to try to catalogue all of these and keep them straight throughout the book, I would have given myself a headache or needed a spreadsheet to keep up with them all. This density of information would likely put off most readers. It also took me longer to get through than I expected. I still found myself intrigued by the concept even though the subtitle hypes it up a little too much. A little less density and a little more creativity in the narrative would go a long way.
kikiandarrowsfishshelf's review against another edition
4.0
Ah Paris. Filled with can-can girls and wine. Poets and painters. There is that Spanish guy, you know the male slut, and he did that blue painting with the bull.
But seriously folks, and this is a serious book, And the Show Went On is a rather close and compelling look at how the artists of all stripes (painters, writers, dancers, singers and so on) coped (or didn’t) while France was under Nazi Occupation. The focus is mostly on Paris though Vichy France is discussed as well.
It does raise interesting questions. What exactly is going too far? When do you get too chummy? And how can you rebel if you are too old, too scared, too whatever? Riding looks at the different artists as well as the different ways in which they dealt with the war. This includes anything from collaborating (Vichy France, as Riding describes it sounds like a Nazi Germany in the making) to joining the marquise to areas where lines between good and bad are not quite so clear. Of course, there are artists who for whatever reason could not fight back and why – usually because they have been sent to their deaths.
Some of the heroes, if that is the correct word, are surprising, and some of the villains are surprising as well. Regardless, your understanding of Occupied Paris will increase.
But seriously folks, and this is a serious book, And the Show Went On is a rather close and compelling look at how the artists of all stripes (painters, writers, dancers, singers and so on) coped (or didn’t) while France was under Nazi Occupation. The focus is mostly on Paris though Vichy France is discussed as well.
It does raise interesting questions. What exactly is going too far? When do you get too chummy? And how can you rebel if you are too old, too scared, too whatever? Riding looks at the different artists as well as the different ways in which they dealt with the war. This includes anything from collaborating (Vichy France, as Riding describes it sounds like a Nazi Germany in the making) to joining the marquise to areas where lines between good and bad are not quite so clear. Of course, there are artists who for whatever reason could not fight back and why – usually because they have been sent to their deaths.
Some of the heroes, if that is the correct word, are surprising, and some of the villains are surprising as well. Regardless, your understanding of Occupied Paris will increase.
jdukuray's review
5.0
Fascinating and informative history of Paris under German occupation that explores the spectrum of collaboration to resistance on the part of artists and writers. Both collaboration and resistance came in many stripes and gradations of involvement. Sartre, for example, seems not to have done much in the way of resistance, but in the aftermath becomes something of a spokesman for those years. I was introduced to many figures previously unknown to me including Leon Blum, social democratic leader prior to the occupation; Jean Guehenno and Jean Paulhan, both writers and resisters, who wrote about their experiences; also Varian Fry, who was an American who came to France and helped rescue as many as 2,000 French and/or Jews under threat from the Germans.
I was also interested to learn something about the relation between the German occupiers and the Vichy government. In all circles, there were not a few hateful anti-semites and enthusiastic Nazi supporters. It is striking to read about people who believed Nazism held the key to correct for the supposed decadence of democratic political systems. But there are as well stories of great courage and clear-headedness.
I cannot help read a book like this and wonder how I might respond in similar circumstances, under the duress and fear of a totalitarian regime. It is easy to see how much one might prefer to stay small and go unnoticed and hope for the best. But that is also the measure of the courage exhibited by those who participated actively in the resistance.
Highly recommended.
I was also interested to learn something about the relation between the German occupiers and the Vichy government. In all circles, there were not a few hateful anti-semites and enthusiastic Nazi supporters. It is striking to read about people who believed Nazism held the key to correct for the supposed decadence of democratic political systems. But there are as well stories of great courage and clear-headedness.
I cannot help read a book like this and wonder how I might respond in similar circumstances, under the duress and fear of a totalitarian regime. It is easy to see how much one might prefer to stay small and go unnoticed and hope for the best. But that is also the measure of the courage exhibited by those who participated actively in the resistance.
Highly recommended.
juliechristinejohnson's review
4.0
I give this 4-stars from sheer awe at the breadth of research and in recognition of the value of this book as a resource. If you are at all interested in--as a personal pursuit or as part of scholarly research--France, French literature, art, cinema, World War II, or the presence and impact of the arts during war, this is a must-have companion. But it may be most useful when employed as an encyclopedia, rather than a sit-down-and-read-cover-to-cover book. I did, but it wasn't pretty. There is such a volume of names, institutions, occurrences that the forest went missing in all the trees. I came away with very little emotional sense of what Paris was like for an actor, writer, dancer, painter, singer '39-45, but at least I knew what most everyone involved in some aspect of the art world was doing. And not just in Paris, but in the South, where many of the artist cognoscenti fled when the Germans arrived.
That being said, there were some fascinating, moving and telling sections dealing with Camus, Colette, Sartre, the American-born French socialite Florence Gould, Irène Némirovsky, among others. And Riding does an outstanding job of showing the blurred lines between collaborating, resisting, staying the course and simply doing what you can to survive. Artists are people, too.
That being said, there were some fascinating, moving and telling sections dealing with Camus, Colette, Sartre, the American-born French socialite Florence Gould, Irène Némirovsky, among others. And Riding does an outstanding job of showing the blurred lines between collaborating, resisting, staying the course and simply doing what you can to survive. Artists are people, too.
clambook's review
3.0
A survey of how the arts did during the WWII occupation of France. Found it spotty — the review of events served as a pocket history of that part of the war, but the arts portion got tedious. Maybe too many unfamiliar names and too wide a landscape – ballet, writing, painting, music, etc.
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