Then we have the Renard family - whose family dealt with the prejudices of religion, going back and forth from Catholicism to Protestantism and facing the bloody battles that lie between choosing one of those sides over the other in Paris' tumultuous religious history.
The Blanchards started out as renowned doctors and then shifted into owning one of the most successful department stores in Paris. Here we meet an aunt who is friends with artists such as Giverny and Monet, and Marc who becomes an artist himself, and has a bastard daughter (Louise) who is sent to a family in England - although she soon returns to her ties in Paris as she grows up. Then there is Marie, a woman who knows how take care of herself, and herein we have one of the strongest love stories in the book - as she must choose between an American artist she has fallen in love with, an aristocrat (de Cygne) who must leave her, but who she finds again in old age, and then Mr. James Fox - a descendant of the Renard family, who takes her away to England for a time, but she too returns to Paris - a place not to be forgotten once experienced. We also have the Gascon family of Montmartre. Thomas - who meets the engineer Gustave Eiffel and helps him build not only the Statue of Liberty, but the famous Eiffel tower itself. Then there is his brother Luc, a deviant and lying delinquent, who has friends in high places as he sells cocaine to important clientele, and provides any other services one may require - as long as you can pay him. We also have the Jewish Jacob family, who faces discrimination early in France's history, as the Jews are driven out, and then again at the end of the book's account when the Nazis come to take them away and steal their precious collections of art, including works from the artist Degas.
All of these stories are connected to one another, building up alliances and creating enemies among one another; building up secrets, and falling in love. These families realize the importance of love and family; they must suffer through history as it repeats itself. They deal with many different forms of government, and the issues of religion and politics often thrust the greatness of France into chaos and turmoil, but France also sees ages of great artistic achievements, and of gilded palaces and sweeping avenues. We see the Moulin Rouge in all its finery, and visit Versailles, we see the Louvre and hear of the changing uses of the Conciergerie. We see people drinking to the idea of revolution at Le Lapin Agile, or artists talking and writing at Les Deux Magots. We hear of people dancing and eating the Moulin de la Galette - immortalized in a painting by Renoir. One of the families become friends with Ernest Hemingway and his wife Hadley, a couple I read about in the book, The Paris Wife. At the end we see Jean-Paul Sartre rushing down a Parisian street.
The book, simply put, is brilliant. And if you've ever loved hearing about good stories filled with fascinating people and events, as well as ever been interested in Paris as a whole, this book will expose you to more history than you've ever been able to handle before, and it will not only inform you, but intrigue you to want to find out more. The family trees at the front of the book will be referred to often, as you try to keep track of which family member you are hearing about now, as the book jumps frequently between time periods. You may be reading about one of the first de Cygne's in 1261, and then here you are in 1875 as you meet one of his late descendants.
One example of this is that as we approach WWII, having just survived the accounts of WWI, we are thrown back in time to 1794, after the French Revolution. King Louis XVI has just been beheaded, as well as his Queen, the infamous Marie Antoinette. Now we are in the Reign of Terror - a bitter foreshadowing of a soon-to-be reign of terror - that of Hitler's Third Reich. We hear of the Widow Le Sourd getting ready to send the young de Cygne couple to the tribunal as enemies of the state of France. Robespierre, convinced of their guilt, sends them to the conciergerie to be killed. Blanchard, their family doctor, hoping to save them, convinces the "court" that Sophie de Cygne is pregnant, hoping to delay her execution. Miraculously, she ends up being pregnant - preserving the line of de Cygne's, and stopping herself from being killed for lying. She names her son Dieudonne, or gift from God. But again, this incident reminds us of the bitter rivalry between the Le Sourd's and the de Cygne's. Each generation never seems to realize that their families have known each other for centuries, and always in some form betrayed one another, until the 1940s, where WWII brings the young Max Le Sourd and the young Charlie de Cygne together to form the resistance and fight against evil.
The Le Sourd's discuss the need to get the Nazis out of Paris, but Max's father reveals something to his son in the quote that states "Yes. I want the Nazis out, of course. But my ultimate goal is to complete the Revolution, for France to reach her true destiny. And I hope it may be your goal as well." The whole book seems to come back to this point, this theme of getting France to reach her true destiny. Each leader of France, whether it be Napoleon, a King of France, or even the short-lived Paris Commune, wants France to be great, and they want the whole world to recognize the greatness of France.
Themes of Paris, government, politics, religious persecution, love, but mostly history does repeat itself - both in the personal lives of the people who live through it, and in the great city itself. Facing the possibility of French Jews being rounded up and sent away to who knows where, Jacob reflects that perhaps, if he had not known the long history of his people, he might have remained like so many in the Jewish community who refused to believe that a French government could be so evil - but being an art dealer who knows the stories of art and their characters, and the men who commission their beauty - Jacob is keenly aware of the terrible possibilities that lie within the human spirit. We see, early on in the book, that the French government at one point did in fact round up all the Jews and expel them from their country, and any promises made to the Jews by one monarch, were easily expunged by another.
The love stories repeat themselves as well. Marie wanted to marry her American lover and go away with him, but was kept in Europe. Her daughter, Claire, however, falls in love with this American's son and goes away with him as well - only to return to Paris later, just as her own mother returned to Paris after moving to England with her husband when Claire was not yet born.
I know I'm delving too deep into this giant book, but I can't seem to curb my own enthusiasm for its greatness.
The book details the evolution of families, intermingled with one another at various points in time. We start at the time of the Templar Knights, we see their downfall (which occurred to feed the greed of a King). We revel in love stories, forbidden, secret, discouraged love stories. We hear about Parisian culture, art and we experience heart breaking cruelty, and also courageous love and mind-boggling cowardice. These families bend to the times as they witness Paris growing to something magnificent, and also as they see Americans fleeing to Paris to escape a country already so free, but which lacks the rich history that France can offer their young and impressionable young minds. We see monarchists looking down upon the real people of Paris, who always seem to be fighting ruthlessly for a more free, more equal government they can't really achieve.We see people question their moral integrity as they either band together as powerful mobs or disband to save their own asses. We see honor, and liberty. Fraternity. Equality. As Charles de Gaulle liberates Paris from the Germans, thus restoring France to some sort of shaky equilibrium we recognize where this book is heading - France is an eccentric place, filled with idealists who are more than willing to fight for some crazy idea of what will be the BEST destiny for the great France. That will never change, and has never changed from the 1200s to today.
Claire, Marie's daughter, the young woman who followed the path her mother could not by marrying a young American, returns to France and revels in its romance. She loves France, and states that even after living in America all these years, she'd always followed the happenings of this country. Acknowledging not all of it had been happy (the World Wars, for example), Claire express her gratefulness that it has been returned to democracy - and "given the deep richness of France, its economy would bear fruit under almost any government." Despite some embarrassing historical moments, France is still considered by many to be a great empire. The French, and particularly the Parisians, are proud. And change is always inevitable.
Even in the 1960s, Claire witnessed young students, displeased with university conditions, tearing up the old street cobblestones and hurling them at police in protest. They are the students, the workers, the philosophers, the people of Paris - planning a new Paris Commune, and like their ancestors hoping for a new and better world. They are the heirs of the French Revolution ... and it is here in Paris where these young people will always fight to see their Paris reach its great destiny.
You must appreciate the traditional regional chaos of old France, and as de Gaulle had said "How can one govern a country which has 246 kinds of cheese?"
Read this book. As someone who first experience the greatness of Paris in the month of August, the month of holiday in France where many Parisians take vacation, and where the city itself is mostly quiet, I did not understand the deep history of France. I could not understand it at fifteen, but I did feel it. I felt the impressiveness of Notre Dame, and the wonder of the Louvre. The breathtaking views from the top of the Eiffel Tower, and the calm serenity of the Seine. I reveled in the wines and the food, and adored Versailles, where chills ran down my spine. I stood in the Hall of Mirrors and thought of the many famous aristocrats who walked down that hall, and then of the gates being stormed by the people of Paris, demanding change.
Years later I returned to France, but lived in the South - a land very different from the capital city. In revisiting Paris, however, I was reminded of why I fell in love with that city in the first place, and I can understand why Americans, like Fitzgerald and Hemingway, and Gertrude Stein ... I can understand why they flocked to Paris - to live in its complicated, chaotic, poetic, tragic and beautiful confines. This book will draw you into that chaos, and you may find yourself never wanting to leave - in fact, you'll find yourself wanting to do something great with your life. Find love, find happiness, make change. Bonne chance et au revoir mes amis.
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