France: The Nightingale

The Nightingale

by Kristin Hannah

Seems like everyone I know has read this one, and I guess that makes sense since it's been on the NY Times bestseller list for 53 weeks.  The story is richly compelling, one you won't want to put down until you've reached the conclusion.  I love those kinds of novels.  They make me stay up too late at night, walk around the house with the book in my hand, and put off daily chores in favor of squeezing in a few pages at any opportunity. 

Set in France during World War II, this is the story of the French experience of the Holocaust, told from the perspective of two sisters who react to the German occupation very differently but who ultimately find they have more in common than they ever believed possible.  Vianne, the elder sister, is happily married with one child, Sophie, when the war arrives in France and changes everything, beginning with her husband Antoine's departure for the front.  Alone and unsure, she bravely rises to the occasion, coping with the German officers who billet in her home, the loss of her best friend to a concentration camp, and the extreme poverty and hunger that all are facing.  Her younger sister, Isabelle, was always a rebel in youth and continues to be so as she refuses to accept the German occupation of her beloved France and joins the resistance, taking on increasingly dangerous missions to try to save her country and as many human beings as she can along the way.  Their relationship is strained because of childhood trauma - the death of their beloved mother and their father's resulting neglect and absence from their lives.  But as the story unfolds, they realize their beliefs about each other are utterly wrong.  There are more ways than one to be brave and righteous in the face of horror.

I've previously resisted reading Kristin Hannah's novels because I perceived them to be in the chick-lit category, which I have not been very interested in reading.  Holocaust themes, however, generally defy the non-substantive subject matter that I judge chick-lit to embody.  I remember once in grad school, we read Maus I and Maus II, by Art Spiegelman.  These are graphic biographical novels that tell the story of Spiegelman's journey to understand his father's history as a Holocaust survivor and to make sense of their relationship.  The discussions we had in class about these books were complex and heavy ... and ultimately, unanswerable.  How can the Holocaust be conveyed with both accuracy and integrity in any form of art?  Is it appropriate to do so?  Who has the right to do so?  What is our responsibility, as readers, for receiving a biographical account of someone's Holocaust experience?  Does that change if the account is fictional? 

I am drawn to novels about this unthinkable part of human history that took place less than a century ago.  And I've thought a lot about why.  Because it feels really strange to "enjoy" something about a dark stain on humanity.  It's like when my daughter and I visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC last year and afterwards, someone asked us, "Did you have fun?"  Um, ... no.  "Fun" is not the adjective to use for the Holocaust Museum, and neither is "enjoy."  We were so somber, so introspective, so humbled as we walked through the exhibits, we did not speak.  After a short time, we went in separate directions, silently agreeing that we needed to bear witness in our own private ways.

And that's what I think Holocaust fiction does.  It forces us to bear witness.  To look with eyes that can't be shut, to remember, hold space for the victims, and respect the survivors and their descendants who live with the weight of this history.