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.

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Duff Cooper, was the first post-war British ambassador to Paris, and his private diaries and papers provide one of the unpublished sources for this book.

Reviews

Early postwar France saw the trials of collaborationist leaders, de Gaulle's reestablishment of the republic and his abrupt resignation in 1946, widespread panic at the prospect of a Communist or right-wing coup and the arrival of Marshall Plan aid, which rescued the country from economic collapse. This engaging chronicle set in Paris--a magnet for Picasso, Sartre, de Beauvoir, Camus, Wright, Orwell, Hemingway, Breton, Koestler, Philby--captures the desperation and exhilaration of those years through a blend of history, eyewitness accounts, interviews, telling incident and gossip. Beevor ( The Spanish Civil War ) and Cooper ( Cairo in the War: 1939-1945 ) illuminate the blind Stalinism of France's ``progressive'' intelligentsia, protracted enmity between resisters and collaborators, early years of the Cold War and France's love-hate relationship with the U.S. (Aug.)

Outstanding, enormously enjoyable, exciting -- Philip Ziegler Daily Telegraph Held me gripped by every page and I was impatient at any interruption. Spellbinding, often frightening and sometimes funny -- Alec Guinness Daily Mail

Husband-and-wife team of Beevor and Cooper have produced a thorough, fascinating account of postwar Paris. The authors focus on three themes: the bitter struggle of Resistance supporters against the collaborators of the Vichy government; the city's emergence as the intellectual and cultural mecca of the world; and the development of a love-hate relationship between France and the country that did the most to liberate it-the United States. Beevor and Cooper benefited from access to private manuscripts, including the papers of Duff Cooper, the British ambassador to France immediately after the war and grandfather of Artemis. The book is filled with sound, balanced insights and witty observations. It should prove enjoyable and valuable both for specialists and general readers. Readers will also value it because it was one of the last projects on which Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis worked as an editor at Doubleday.-T.J. Schaeper, St. Bonaventure Univ., N.Y.