VICHY-FRANCE, PAPON,

and

the Jews

 
 

In March, 1996, after 4 years of research, my book, Un Hiver en Provence (A Winter in Provence), was published by a French publisher, les Éditions de l'Aube. Robert O. Paxton, a renowned expert on the history of Vichy and professor at Columbia University, authored the foreword, and Pierre Vidal-Naquet, the Director of The Centre Louis Gernet at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, wrote the postface. The book is both autobiographical and historical.

The book was extremely well received by the national French press who praised the thoroughness of the research and the quality of the story. For more information, click on the following links:

In May 1997, Un Hiver en Provence won the prestigious Franco-European Award (le Prix Franco-Européen),and le Monde, the French daily, suggested in its January 31, 1997 issue that "the book should become an informal document in the prosecution of the upcoming trial of Maurice Papon," the infamous Vichy collaborator, who pursued for decades a distinguished career in the French administration without any disturbance until he was unmasked in 1982 by Michel Slitinski, one of his victims. My native region had its own Papon as well. The Franco-European Award was reported by Associated Press International and the American press (Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun Times, and other regional newspapers).

On August 31, 1993, NBC Dateline aired a piece about my research, and several articles have also been published in the American press.

Additional references:

  • Quand Isaac Lewendel a cherché à savoir... (l'Humanité- March 11, 97)
  •  An article by Erika Apelbaum contrasting my book with Dan Goldhagen's Hitler's Willing Executioners (Theory and Psychology Journal, Vol 8, Number 5, October 1998, pages 687-690)

I have recently written an article "Le Témoin et sa Mémoire face à l'Histoire" in the magazine La Pensée et les Hommes published in 1998 by Les Éditions de l'Université de Bruxelles.

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