That was my mental picture of France–even before emigration. No wonder, then, that I did not hesitate even for a moment when the problem of emigration presented itself. I could probably have got a visa for England, or for the United States. But in my mind no other country on the globe was even worth considering. Any vacillation would have seemed like doubt of my beloved–like infidelity. France was not only going to take me in and put up with me; she was going to set me straight again, to stand by me. She was going to do everything possible to make the process of ‘recommencer à zéro’–starting again from nothing–an easier one, if not in fact to spare me it altogether. Yes: in my wilder fantasies I even gave in to the madness of imagining that emigration would in the final reckoning turn out to be actually just the fulfilment of my long-treasured desire to live permanently in France. That, in my personal case, the catastrophe of Austria’s invasion would actually be the occasion of a great joy.
Of course, alongside this symphony of hope I did hear another sound, too: a tiny whisper, warning me that this was all a delusion. But I did not want to listen to that whisper. I blocked it out. Even the huge difficulties I had encountered in obtaining a visa did not give me pause for thought.
There was another respect, too, in which I felt like an especially privileged kind of refugee. When, on 18th August 1938, I arrived in Paris, I knew immediately where to go in order to have a roof over my head. So many of my fellow sufferers did not have that good fortune.
My old friend, the art publisher Pierre Vorms, and his wife, received me into their home with the warmest of hospitality, giving my wife and myself two rooms to live in in their charming home on the Quai Louis Blériot. Another old friend, Emil Kofler,* arranged (in the most tactful manner possible) that I could draw money at his bank. And my niece, Louise Schwarzmann, who at that time lived in Lausanne, also made some money available to me. In short, I was not compelled to engage in the harsh struggle for the daily crust from the very first moment. I had been granted a breathing space, which I wanted to use to look up old acquaintances and reestablish contacts. I had also taken it upon myself to keep on drawing people’s attention to the Brown Peril, whenever the opportunity arose. My experiences, I thought, should at least entitle me to do that.
‘Today Germany–tomorrow the whole world.’ This threat, after all, applied to the people of my beloved France too.
Why had France not reacted in any appropriate way when Hitler simply grabbed Austria?… Still, you forgive many things, with a lover…
Before continuing with my personal story, I should like first to say a few words about the climate of opinion at that time–hardly more than a year before the outbreak of the War. What I shall say applies to the situation in Paris. I doubt, however, whether the climate of opinion in the country as a whole was significantly different. If it had been, subsequent events might have been a little different.
At a very simple, basic level, the mentality can be summed up by an expression which one used to hear all the time: ‘Pas d’histoires!’ ‘No stories!’ Let’s have no trouble–no unpleasantness. In other words, we want a peaceful life and we aren’t going to trouble ourselves about things that don’t concern us in the least. We eat well, we drink well, our women are beautiful, our businesses are prosperous; anything else is just about as important as Hecuba. It doesn’t bother us what happens outside France. As long as Hitler doesn’t interfere in our affairs–and he has no intention of doing so–we don’t need to interfere in his.
‘Pas d’histoires’: a carefree indifference, a lightheartedness verging on frivolity; a cynical self-centredness that hardly even bothered to conceal its true nature with specious justifications; the politics of the ostrich, hiding its head in the sand of everyday life and refusing to see or hear anything. At all costs, let’s have no unpleasantness! The rape of Austria, the shameful betrayal of the Czechs? How can that affect us?… The Germans roar in chorus: ‘Today Germany–tomorrow the whole world!’ So? They’re welcome to it! France is surely not included in this ‘whole world’. We’ve happily gone along with everything that Hitler wanted. He can have the whole world–the rest of it–just so long as we carry on eating well, drinking well, loving well, earning well. Pas d’histoires!
What, then, of the younger generation–surely they saw things differently? I have to say that among the younger generation, too, there was all too often a terrifying materialism, a cynical rejection of all ideals, a desire to get ahead that was directed at purely financial and hedonistic goals, and that saw education or culture solely as means to the end of acquiring sinecures in the civil service or in political life. This section of the younger generation looked up only to the débrouillards, the people who knew how to get on in life, to ‘arrange’ things–people who have brought to a pitch of perfection the techniques of pistonnage: of patronage, of creating and exploiting a network of influential individuals.
In every kind of social context, I attempted to open people’s eyes to the reality of Hitler and Germany. And everywhere I encountered one of two reactions: an attitude of sympathy mixed with total disbelief; or one of bored indifference. If, that is, they were prepared to listen at all: sometimes I even provoked a degree of irritation.
One reaction that comes vividly to mind was at a party which included people from a wide range of professions, among them influential journalists. The host–normally a quite amiable individual–cried with unconcealed anger: ‘But why are you telling us all these tales?’ He was right.
In this context, particular mention should be made of the attitude among French Jews. I have to say that, in spite of the fact that they had every reason to open their eyes and ears, they for the most part were even less keen to know than the French ‘Aryans’.
To add to ‘Pas d’histoires!’ this group had another refrain, too: ‘Chez nous en France, tout cela serait impossible.’ ‘Here in France none of that could ever happen.’ And woe to the man who dared to admit the slightest doubt as to the certainty of this categorical pronouncement. One could make oneself quite unpopular even by the subtlest reference to their Jewishness. This would tend to be seen as rather tactless–a faux pas. And any mention of the word ‘anti-Semitism’ was greeted with a dismissive wave of the hand–if, in fact, its existence was not explicitly denied. The notion that there might ever be discrimination between ‘Aryans’ and ‘non-Aryans’ in France, too, was to them unimaginable.
In relation to us refugees they observed a certain distance. There was a definite anxiety not to be mixed up with us, not to be tarred with the same brush. They were ‘long-standing’ or ‘settled’ inhabitants. While the other French citizens had no desire to hear what was happening outside France, the French Jews clamped their ears shut whenever anyone started talking about Hitler and his unhealthy obsession with the Jews.
One of them once said to me straight out: ‘On en marre de vos histoires juives.’ ‘We’re really fed up with all your Jewish stories.’
The attitude of those Jews resident in France who were foreigners, but not refugees, meanwhile, was no better. These individuals preferred to regard themselves as little outposts of their various home countries, and were keen to make clear the distinction between them, with their affiliation to a native land, and us, with our affiliation to a No-Man’s-Land. They had a right to be considered as guests; we had to consider ourselves lucky to be put up with.
And yet none of this prevented Charles Maurras* (who had been presented with a valuable sword by his Jewish admirers on the occasion of his election to the Académie Française) from writing that it was the Jews who were responsible for forcing France to attack the peace-loving, well-intentioned Hitler. Why, Jewish refugees had even had the nerve to celebrate France’s declaration of war with champagne!
4
Earning the first hundred francs
I HAD ARRIVED IN PARIS, then, on 18th August. My wife joined me a few days later.
For the first few weeks, everything seemed to be going well. Everywhere I we
nt I was greeted with the most encouraging words. The important thing for you now is to have a bit of a break. Everything else will fall into place in due course.
Jules Romains,* the president of the French PEN, received me in the friendliest manner and opened doors for me immediately. My wife and I were invited to a dinner held specially to greet us at the headquarters of the PEN in Rue Pierre Charron. Speeches, heart-warming words, tears in the eyes. I felt like the prodigal son who has at last come home.
At the end of this wonderful, unforgettable evening I was left with the definite impression that, as far as starting a new life here was concerned, my only problem would be to know which of the many offers to take up.
But as the days, and then weeks, went by I was unable to convert any of all those beautiful promises into reality. Only Benjamin Crémieux*–a good man–did something concrete to back his willingness to help: by his personal intervention with the police chief he succeeded in having me issued with–wonder of wonders!–an identity card valid for three years.
I had already gone here, there and everywhere in my search for some kind of starting point. Some way into the ‘recommencer à zéro’. I was forced with ever greater clarity to the conclusion that as far as France was concerned–the France of my dreams–I was just some refugee in search of a job. A poor wretch that the Beloved has tired of. She very politely offered me a chair, but she placed it outside the door. My time was up. Everywhere I came up against a sort of rubber wall–an elastic form of refusal–especially in places where in earlier times I had always found the doors thrown open for me; places where I used to encounter that particular kind of helpfulness that is only offered to those who are independent and are not asking for anything.
There is a French saying: ‘On ne prête qu’aux riches.’ You only lend to a rich man.
One day, I finally said farewell to any attempt to see the present in the same terms as the past. Time, I decided, to draw a firm line under it. Armed in this way, I set out again.
Purely on the off-chance, I called in at a translation service not far from the Trinité, and asked to speak to the manager. I was mistaken for a new client, and brought immediately to the patronne, Madame F., a powerfully built woman already in her maturer years.
Well, first of all I had to clear up the misunderstanding: I was not a client. In fact, I was looking for work.
The charming smile on the face of Madame F. transformed itself instantly into the haughty demeanour of the potential employer. She examined me, hesitated, then asked me a few questions. ‘Austrian… refugee… there are so many of them these days… Writer, you say? Well, wait a moment… perhaps I do have something for you.’
She disappeared and returned with an envelope, from which she took out a thick letter.
‘I have here a letter,’ she said to me. ‘Your job would be to translate it from German into French, but… we are not talking about a literal translation. What I need is… how can I put it?… more of a… free version. A reworking.’
I must have reacted with a certain air of bewilderment, because Madame F. smiled in amusement, before adding: ‘You’ll soon see what I mean. This is a love letter. A love letter from a lady, who has entrusted it to us to be translated, because she knows that she can rely on our absolute discretion. Some time ago this lady became acquainted with a Viennese gentleman here in Paris, who subsequently returned home. They write letters to each other. But the gentleman speaks not a word of French and the lady not a word of German.’
I began to understand, though still only imperfectly. ‘The lady,’ Madame F. went on, ‘is an excellent client, and I consider it of the utmost importance to keep her happy. I have a number of highly efficient translators at my disposal–but in the present case that is not sufficient.’
Madame F. lit a cigarette. A naughty, knowing smile spread over her already somewhat flushed face. She continued her explanation.
‘The lady, you must understand, is terribly in love. The more passionate, the more thrilling, the letters that she receives, the better for her–and the better for us. You say that you are a writer. I suppose, then, I may take it that–in addition to your linguistic abilities–you also have imagination and… panache.’
I gave a flattered bow.
‘Well, then,’ Madame F. concluded. ‘Give your imagination and panache free rein. Use them to your heart’s content. Exaggerate, embellish–beef it up–in fact, add whatever words of your own you think necessary. Be lyrical, pathetic, tender, passionate… and above all let us have no false modesty. Don’t be embarrassed to call certain things by their names. The lady is not only very much in love, she is also of a very passionate disposition. The usual fee for the translation would be fifty francs. But if you do the job well, you can have a hundred. And for every subsequent letter too.’
Next day I presented Madame F. with my concoction. After checking it over, she gracefully handed me a one-hundred-franc note. And from then on, regularly, every eight days, I received a letter to… adapt.
After a while I got so much into the swing of it that I could probably have satisfied our client’s taste even without reference to the ‘original’. And secretly I hoped that this was the love that–at one hundred francs a week–would last forever.
This glorious state of affairs, however, was destined for an early end. Not that the passion of my Viennese friend was ever going to let up. I would have made sure of that. But war came, and with it the end of the idyll.
A real shame, that.
In January of 1939 we were able to rent a small apartment in the 15th arrondissement. Shortly after that we were joined by our beloved friend Miss Sláva Kolářová. From Czechoslovakia, where, as a one-hundred-per-cent Aryan, she could have lived undisturbed with her mother and siblings, she came to us, a voluntary refugee, if you like–and even a voluntary Jew, as will be seen in what follows.
If a novelist had decided to invent a woman like this, readers would shake their heads cynically. ‘Far-fetched,’ they would say. ‘The sort of thing you only get in novels.’ Well, we got it in ‘real life’ too–this miracle of goodness and loyalty. It actually happens. And the fact that it can happen is more than a consolation; it is a light in the darkness, a light from above.
Sláva Kolářová had shared our life for nearly thirty years. She had brought up our children, and was my wife’s closest friend. Life without her would have seemed unimaginable to us. And yet, when we were forced to emigrate, we insisted that she must be separated from us and us from her. To bring her along with us on our journey of uncertainty, trouble, hardship–how could we have that on our conscience?
It was almost by force that we finally made her return to her family in Bohemia, who took her in with open arms. The moment when we had to say goodbye to her in Vienna was one of the hardest of our lives.
And then, one fine day–here she was again. With us in Paris. She had simply not been able to take it any more. Always so shy, so helpless–she had managed to get herself a permit to travel and a visa. Not only that–she had brought a few thousand francs, too… She not only wanted to share in our destiny, to take our woes upon herself, to help us to get our daily bread. She had also already sacrificed her last savings for us.
It happens.
So there were three of us, now: in it together. I did my translations, published an article occasionally in this or that newspaper or magazine, and busied myself in my free time as a delivery boy. My wife and Sláva made Viennese cakes and pastries that became quite popular; and I used to take them to the relevant houses. On several days of the week Sláva also did housework for a family at five francs an hour. And the two women also had knitting to do in the evening–or often at night. There was of course no question of going for a walk, of doing something for pleasure.
But we were content. We had a roof over our heads, and a few good friends. Our sons were able to complete their studies in England. And we had something else, too, that made up for all the trouble and fatigue: we could bre
athe freely. We did not have to jump whenever there was a ring at the door.
If anyone could have told us then what the future held…
5
The men in berets
SEPTEMBER 1939.
For an unconscionable time France had had her head buried in the sand, in spite of the shameful tragi-comedy of Munich and everything which followed from it. ‘Pas d’histoires.’ Meanwhile Hitler was allowed to plan his next attacks as calmly and thoroughly as he liked. Within France itself, the ‘Fifth Column’, that admirably well-developed organ of Nazi espionage and propaganda, was able to carry out its sinister poisonous underground activities almost openly.
And now the Brown Reptile thought that the time was ripe. The War had come.
The émigré body in France was both able and willing to undertake work which could have been of value for the country’s defence in all kinds of ways; in fact, they desired nothing more. All that would have been necessary was to bring that body together and use their resources in appropriate ways. But–as a good Frenchman, François Crucy,* put it to me at the time, with bitter irony–‘En France, on s’organise toujours après.’ In France we always organise after the event.
What was the first thing that happened? A brief account of my personal experience may serve better than any general summary.
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