One Hundred Twenty-One Days (19 page)

Once upon a time, in a remote region of a faraway land, there lived a little boy.

SUPERNUMERARY CHAPTER

(
PARIS-STRASBOURG
, 2009-2013)

As one of its characters rightly says, this book is a novel, a work of fiction. Its characters are imaginary. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental or due to the permanence of human behavior.

The names of some of these characters have been taken from (or inspired by) various books, including
THE LILY OF THE VALLEY
(Honoré de Balzac),
A GALLERY PORTRAIT
and
W OR THE MEMORY OF CHILDHOOD
(Georges Perec),
THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO
(Alexandre Dumas), and
THE MASTER AND MARGARITA
(Mikhail Bulgakov).

The book cites, uses, or evokes a certain number of other works, not always explicitly mentioned, including (in alphabetical order and with the corresponding chapter numbers)
AFTER A READING OF DANTE
(Franz Liszt) – VII;
ALMANSOR
(Heinrich Heine) – X;
APRIL IN PARIS
(Vernon Duke & E.Y. Harburg) – XI;
CHANSON DE CRAONNE
(Anonymous) – II;
CHANSON DE L
’
UNIVERSITÉ DE STRASBOURG
(Aragon) – VIII;
COMPLAINTE DE ROBERT-LE-DIABLE
(Aragon) – XI;
CONVERSATIONS IN EXILE
(Bertolt Brecht) – IV;
DE L
’
UNIVERSITÉ AUX CAMPS DE CONCENTRATION
–
TÉMOIGNAGES STRASBOURGEOIS
(collective) – VII, VIII, IX;
DICHTERLIEBE
(Heinrich Heine) – VIII;
DOCTOR FAUSTUS
(Thomas Mann) – V;
FANTASIA K
475 (Mozart) – IV, VIII, IX;
FAUST
(Goethe) – VII;
FORCE OF CIRCUMSTANCE
(Simone de Beauvoir) – XI;
FOURTEENTH SONATA, QUASI UNA FANTASIA
(Beethoven) – X;
GRETCHEN AM SPINNRADE
(Goethe) – VI;
IF
(Rudyard Kipling) – I, II;
JOURNAL
(André Gide) – II;
JOURNAL DE GUERRE
(Ernst Jünger) – V;
JUST SO STORIES
(Rudyard Kipling) – I, XI;
LA CROIX DE BOIS
(Paul Harel) – II;
LA ROSE ET LA RÉSÉDA
(Aragon) – XI;
LES ÉTUDES ET LA GUERRE
(Stéphane Israël) – X;
LES NOMBRES REMARQUABLES
(François Le Lionnais & Jean Brette) – VII, IX;
ON THE NATURAL HISTORY OF DESTRUCTION
(W. G. Sebald) – VII, IX;
PAINTING AT DORA
(François Le Lionnais) – VII;
PARIS DANS LA COLLABORATION
(Cécile Desprairies) – V, XI;
PÈRE GORIOT
(Honoré de Balzac) – XI;
POEMS
(St. Thérèse of Lisieux) – II;
ROBERT LE DIABLE
(Meyerbeer) – III;
SHOULD WE PARDON THEM
? (Vladimir Jankélévitch) – XI;
SURVIVAL IN AUSCHWITZ
(Primo Levi) – VIII;
THE CHARTERHOUSE OF PARMA
(Stendhal) – VIII, IX, XI;
THE DAMNATION OF FAUST
(Hector Berlioz) – II;
THE DIVINE COMEDY
(Dante) – VII, VIII;
THE DROWNED AND THE SAVED
(Primo Levi) – IX;
THE LIGHTS GO DOWN
(Erika Mann) – VI;
THE LOST ONES
(Samuel Beckett) – VII;
THE MASTER AND MARGARITA
(Mikhail Bulgakov) – III, VI;
THE NIGHT WATCHMAN OF PONT-AU-CHANGE
(Robert Desnos) – VIII, XI;
THE ODYSSEY
(Homer) – VII;
THE TWO GRENADIERS
(Heinrich Heine) – I, V;
THE TWO GRENADIERS
(Heinrich Heine & Robert Schumann) – XI;
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA
(Shakespeare) – II;
UN DÉPORTÉ BRISE SON SILENCE
(Robert Francès) – VII, VIII, IX;
UNE HISTOIRE MODÈLE
(Raymond Queneau) – VII.

Thank you to all the authors of all these works, but also to Sébastien Balibar, Anne F. Garréta, Pierre Lévy, Sylvie Roelly, Olivier Salon, Norbert Schappacher, and Simone Weiller. Thanks to their help, this book could be written. It was composed mainly in Strasbourg and Paris, from October 2009 to September 2013.

Various places are mentioned (in alphabetical order): Africa, Aix-la-Chapelle, Alexandria, Alsace, Ardennes, Athens, Atlantic (ocean), Auschwitz, Bangor, Belgium, Berlin, Boston, Brittany, Buchenwald, Cambridge, Canaries (islands), Chartres, Chatou, Chemin des Dames, Clermont-Ferrand (Place de Jaude), Cologne, Digne, Dora, Douaumont, Drancy, Dresden, Europe, France, Fribourg, Germany, Hamburg, Holland, Istanbul, Italy, Kursk, Le Chesnay, Lodi, London, Lyon, Marseilles, Mediterranean (sea), Metz, Mexico, Midwest (American), Milan, Monowitz, Montluçon, Morocco, Moscow, Munich, N. (Goethestrasse, Humboldtstrasse, Marienfriedhof, Marktplatz, Schillerstrasse, the university), Nevers, Normandy, Oxford, Padua, Paris (Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile, Rue d’Artois, Rue du Bac, Rue Blanche, Rue Caulaincourt, Avenue des Champs-Élysées, Pont au Change, Lycée Chaptal, Rue de Chateaudun, Rue de la Chaussée-d’Antin, Rue Claude-Bernard, Boulevard de Clichy, Place du Colonel-Rol-Tanguy, Avenue de la Croix, Rue Danielle-Casanova, Rue Dante, Rue Delambre, Square d’Estienne-d’Orves, Avenue Dubuisson, Place de l’Étoile, Avenue Foch, Avenue du Général-Lemonnier, Boulevard Haussmann, Avenue Hector-Berlioz, Invalides, Avenue d’Italie, Rue Lagrange, Lycée Louis-le-Grand, the arches of the Louvre, Hotel Lutetia, Jardin du Luxembourg, Gare de Lyon,
Hotel Majestic, Rue de Médicis, Rue de Ménilmontant, Rue Meyerbeer, Montmartre Cemetery, Montparnasse Cemetery, Gare Montparnasse, Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs, Avenue de l’Opéra, Palais-Royal, Père-Lachaise Cemetery, Rue Pierre-Curie, Avenue Principale, Rue des Pyramides, Avenue Rachel, Hotel Raphael, Boulevard Raspail, Rue du Rohan, Pont Royal, Rue Saint-Dominique, Saint-Germain-des-Prés, Rue Saint-Jacques, Boulevard Saint-Michel, Saint-Philippe-du-Roule, Place Saint-Sulpice, Place de la Sorbonne, Rue Soufflot, Les Tourelles camp, Trocadéro, Jardin des Tuileries, Impasse de Valmy, Carrefour Vavin, Rue Véron, Rue du Vieux-Colombier), Petrograd, Poelkapelle, Poland, Russia, Saint-Maurice, Saint-Nazaire, Senegal, Sigmaringen, Spain, Strasbourg (Palais Universitaire, Vauban Stadium), Switzerland, Troy, United States, Upper Silesia, Vallorbe, Verdun, Vichy, Vienna, Warsaw, Weimar, Wölfersheim, Ypres.

INDEX OF PROPER NAMES

A
      Alexander:
146

André,
see
Silberberg (André)

Apfeldorf (Ernst von):
83-84
,
91
,
93
,
135-137

Apfeldorf (Frau von):
84
,
135-136

Aragon (Louis):
102
,
147

B
      Bach (Johann Sebastian):
114

Balzac (Honoré de):
153

Bamberger (Simone):
114
,
117

Beauvoir (Simone de):
153

Beckett (Samuel):
94
,
120-121

Beethoven (Ludwig van):
69
,
122
,
135
,
137

Bergamotte (Doctor):
34
,
36

Berry (Jules):
93

Besson (Berthe):
142

Besson (Christiane),
see
Mallet (Christiane)

Besson (Jean):
142

Besson (Marie):
39
,
72-75
,
142

Besson (Marie-Claude):
142

Billotte-Yersin (Catherine):
63
,
144

Blank (Leutnant Doktor):
64-65

Bonaparte (Napoleon):
122
,
146
,
149

Bonnard (Abel):
70

Breker (Arno):
70

Brisson (Major de):
16
,
19
,
23-24
,
29

Brueghel (Pieter):
94

Bunsen (Robert):
82

Busoni (Doctor):
100
,
112

C
      C. (Georges):
70-71
,
78
,
152

Caesar:
146

Carabosse (fairy):
23

Carmo:
46

Casanova (Danielle):
149
,
155

Céline (Louis-Ferdinand):
152

Christian,
see
M. (Christian)

Churchill (Winston):
101

Clara,
see
Silberberg (Clara)

Cocteau (Jean):
70

Connan (Roger):
151
,
155

D
      Danglars (André),
see
Silberberg (André)

Daniel (Andrée):
129
,
142
,
145

Dante:
24
,
59
,
67
,
93-94
,
101
,
111
,
116
,
118
,
120

Debalme (Doctor):
18-19

Delambre (Jean-Baptiste):
153

Desnos (Robert):
101
,
114
,
154

Dreyfus (Alfred):
25
,
152

Dubois (Anne):
39
,
72-73
,
142

Dubois (Patrick):
142

Dubois (Pierre-Marie):
142

Durenberger (Françoise),
see
M. (Françoise)

Duvivier (Claude):
38
,
40
,
42
,
98
,
106
,
116

Duvivier (Mireille):
40
,
42
,
46
,
59
,
98-120
,
122
,
126
,
129
,
132-134
,
147
,
151-152
,
154-155

Duvivier (Nicole):
32
,
35-36
,
38
,
40
,
42
,
46
,
98-101
,
112
,
115
,
120
,
134

E
      Epting (Karl):
70

Estienne d’Orves (Honoré d’):
147

Euler (Leonhardt):
119

F
      Faust:
135

Feinstein (Madeleine):
114
,
117

FFI, unknown member of:
151
,
155

Fried (Maurice):
67
,
153

Friedrich (Doctor):
83
,
92

G
      Gambetta (Léon):
38

Gaulle (Charles de):
101
,
103