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<\/a>Les Parisiennes —– by Anne Sebba (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, UK\/St. Martin’s Press, NY, 2016) [Photograph by Edith-Mary Smith]<\/p><\/div>What is it that Rick (played by Humphrey Bogart) says in the movie Casablanca<\/a> when Ilsa (played by Ingrid Bergman) asks if he remembers Paris?<\/p>\n Rick says, \u201cI remember every detail. You wore blue; the Germans wore grey.\u201d<\/p>\n Those lines were spoken in a movie about a memorable time in the history of Paris, the City of Light<\/em>, which was very much a city of women during 1940—1944, when Paris was occupied by the German\u00a0army.<\/p>\n Anne Sebba has written a remarkable book, Les Parisiennes<\/em>,\u00a0describing Paris and the lives of its women during that dark period, les Ann\u00e9es Noires<\/em>.<\/p>\n So many Frenchmen had been captured or were fighting overseas or were forced to work in factories, far from home. To a large part, it was left to the women to face the conquerors. Increasingly desperate for food, the women of Paris, whether wealthy or poor,\u00a0became engaged in the everyday struggle to survive.<\/p>\n Sensitive as well as thorough, Les Parisiennes<\/em> records the details of the world of women in wartime Paris, from Elizabeth Arden’s paint-on stockings to the cost of a packet of cigarettes, from French traitors to heroines, such as Odette, and let’s not forget the German<\/em> women of Paris, the Blitzweiben<\/em>—so-called \u2018little Grey Mice\u2019—who were posted to the city and saw Paris from the eyes of the foreign tourist. Neither does Anne Sebba forget the brave Frenchwomen who perished, nor those\u00a0who were deported and endured the hell of concentration camps, like Ravensbr\u00fcck.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What is it that Rick (played by Humphrey Bogart) says in the movie Casablanca when Ilsa (played by Ingrid Bergman) asks if he remembers Paris? Rick says, \u201cI remember every detail. You wore blue; the Germans wore grey.\u201d Those lines … Continue reading