The French culture minister’s recent announcement that the Musée d’Orsay is to return a Klimt to the heirs of its Viennese Jewish owner, forced to sell it in 1938, shows how much the plunder of art by the Nazis is a live issue even today. James McAuley’s book provides the backstory to what was a far-reaching and systematic crime with a meticulous overview of Jewish art collectors in early 20th-century France – a glittering milieu that included the Camondos, Ephrussis and Rothschilds – and tells how, despite sacrificing their sons to the country’s army, so many were ultimately betrayed.
The House of Fragile Things (James McAuley, Yale, 2022, ISBN 9780300264692, 320pp, £11.99)
NOTES
This book review was written for the June 2022 issue of France magazine, cancelled when a change of ownership brought an end to print publication; the title now exists in online form only.
For more information about this and other titles from Yale, click here. To read more of my book reviews and other published work, click here.