Product Description

Post liberation Paris – an epoch charged with political and conflicting emotions. Liberation was greeted with joy but marked by recriminations and the trauma of purges. The feverish intellectual arguments of the young took place amidst the mundane reality of hunger and fuel shortages. This is a stunning historical account of one of the most stimulating periods in twentieth century French history.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #19231 in Books
• Published on: 2007-10-04
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 464 pages

Review
Outstanding, enormously enjoyable, exciting (Daily Telegraph )

Held me gripped by every page and I was impatient at any interruption. Spellbinding, often frightening and sometimes funny (Daily Mail )

About the Author
Antony Beevor began his career as a professional officer in the 11th Hussars. He is the author of several books, including The Spanish Civil War, Crete and The Mystery of Olga Chekhova. With his wife, Artemis Cooper, he wrote Paris After the Liberation, but he is best known for his books Berlin and Stalingrad, the international No 1 bestseller, and winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize, Wolfson Price and Hawthornden Prize. He lives in London and Kent. Artemis Cooper is the author of several books, including Cairo in the War 1939-1945 and Writing at the Kitchen Table. Her grandfather, Duff Cooper, was the first post-war British ambassador to Paris, and his private diaries and papers provide one of the unpublished sources for this book.

Customer Reviews

Post-war Paris in a nutshell
This well written book provides a highly amusing portrait of Paris after the war. It covers politics, literature and the night life. Sartre and all the rest of the crew. It explains why the communists are still a force in politics now and reveals a shrewd understanding of the French psyche.

It is certainly worth buying. Up in the same league as Beevor's book on Stalingrad.

The best I've ever read on this subject
Readers of history books have come to expect nothing but the best from Anthony Beevor and this is no exception. The superb pairing of Beevor with Artemis Cooper has produced an excellent account (certainly the best I've read) on France during and after the Liberation.

Cooper (a descendent of Duff Cooper, the first post-war ambassador to France) provides a massive contribution to the text with the diaries and letters of Duff and Diana Cooper which inspires a wholly original and unique insight to the politics at the time.
This, added to the exceptionally accessible style of Beevor, makes a thoroughly enjoyable, as well as informative read.

The only criticism I can think of is the occasional niggling feeling at the end of the odd paragraph that the story that has just been recounted was not quite finished. This is certainly not a common occurrence and does not at all detract from the main body of the narrative.

The book covers many aspects of life after the Libreation in Paris - not just political, it also focuses a great deal on the lives of intellectuals and artists - and also gives an idea as to the suffering of France generally in those hard years.

In conclusion I must recommend this book to anyone with even the vaguest interest in French social history.

Could do better
I was really looking forward to this book having read "Berlin" from the same author. However this book becomes very disjointed and difficult. For Military enthusiasts I wouls stay clear of this book. For social historians then this would probably be on your top 10 list.

Be prepared for little French phrases during the course of the book as well. This may satisfy the authors literary cravings but does little for the reader sometimes who does not have the required comprehension of the French language. Whilst none of these pieces are major they take the gloss off what appears to be a well researched book.