Customer Reviews

Night of the Girondists

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This book is raw and frightening in its testimony of the struggle within one man between the good and evil. Written in the first person it reads as an imperfect confession. The proganist, named Jacques as per the author, betrays the confusion within his soul as he bears witness to his own collusion with the Nazis.
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The narrative moves from the relative safety of simply describing atrocious events, to the fringes of thoughts even more unbearable, those where the confessor hints at his own fragmentation, his own identifcation with the will of his oppressors.
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To document the lack of coherence within a soul is difficult enough, but to set this against the Holocaust is especially fraught. Primo Levi provides an introduction to this book and he notes its weaknesses of style and judgement, along with its courage and poignancy in its ambition.
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The author was in fact a teacher in a Jewish school in Holland during WWII, and his wife died in Sobibor, having been detained in Westerbork camp - the setting for much of the book. After her arrest, Presser hid until the end of the occupation. He became a Professor of modern history. This short book (79 pages) was written quickly, between his researches, and entered anonymously into a literary competition which it won.
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The perspective this book provides, while not unique, remains sufficiently its own and, as such, cannot but inspire reflection, and sadness.