The house of fragile things : Jewish art collectors and the fall of France

McAuley, James K. (James Kelly) 1989- (author.).

Summary: In the dramatic years between 1870 and the end of World War II, a number of prominent French Jews--pillars of an embattled community--invested their fortunes in France's cultural artifacts, sacrificed their sons to the country's army, and were ultimately rewarded by seeing their collections plundered and their families deported to Nazi concentration camps. In this rich, evocative account, James McAuley explores the central role that art and material culture played in the assimilation and identity of French Jews in the fin-de-si�ecle. Weaving together narratives of various figures, some familiar from the works of Marcel Proust and the diaries of Jules and Edmond Goncourt--the Camondos, the Rothschilds, the Ephrussis, the Cahens d'Anvers--McAuley shows how Jewish art collectors contended with a powerful strain of anti-Semitism: they were often accused of "invading" France's cultural patrimony. The collections these families left behind--many ultimately donated to the French state--were their response, tragic attempts to celebrate a nation that later betrayed them.

Record details

ISBN: 9780300264692
ISBN: 9780300233377
ISBN: 0300264690
ISBN: 030023337X
ISBN: 9780300252545
ISBN: 0300252544
Physical Description: 1 online resource (xii, 301 pages) : illustrations, maps
remote
Computer data.
Publisher: New Haven : Yale University Press, [2021]
Copyright: �2021

Content descriptions

General Note:	CatMonthString:june.23 Multi-User.
Bibliography, etc. Note:	Includes bibliographical references and index.
Formatted Contents Note:	Introduction : a letter -- Portraits of a milieu : a Jewish elite in crisis -- Dreyfus and Drumont : towards a material antisemitism -- 'Apogee of the Isra�elite' : Jewish collectors and the First World War -- Mo�ise de Camondo : chaos and control -- Th�eodore Reinach : Jewish past, French future -- B�eatrice �Ephrussi de Rothschild : a woman collects -- Museums of memory : from private collections to national bequests -- To the end of the line : Drancy and Auschwitz -- 'La Petite Ir�ene' : the afterlife of a portrait -- Conclusion : a death certificate.
Type of Computer File or Data Note:	Text (HTML), electronic book.
System Details Note:	Mode of access: Internet.
Terms Governing Use and Reproduction Note:	Access requires VIU IP addresses and is restricted to VIU students, faculty and staff. Access restricted by subscription.
Biographical or Historical Data:	James McAuley is the Paris correspondent for the Washington Post and a contributor to the New York Review of Books. He recently received his doctorate in French history at Oxford.
Issuing Body Note:	Made available online by JSTOR.
Source of Description Note:	Print version record.