A riveting document. This intellectual, a refugee in Nice, lived and kept his diary as an observer on a volcano that he believed dormant. As a Frenchman, he was not threatened in the free zone by the Vichy police; nor did he have to fear the Italian military, protectors of the Jews, who would occupy the southeast of France. But we who know that the Germans will drive out the Italians know the outcome of this suspenseful story, which makes the reading of each page of this diary anguishing: Lucien Dreyfus, so representative of a culturally refined elite, will perish in a gas chamber.

Serge Klarsfeld, Nazi hunter and French activist, coauthor of Hunting the Truth

Lucien Dreyfus’s remarkable memoir of Jewish life in wartime France belongs on every bookshelf. Through the keen observations and sharp intellect of an insightful, acerbic Alsatian Jew taking refuge in southern France, we see the growing embrace of antisemitism in France on the one hand, and the courage and kindness of helpful neighbors on the other. Out of a deep knowledge of European culture and traditional Jewish texts, Dreyfus struggles to understand and give meaning to the events of his time. His memoir and the unusual story of the diary’s survival engages French history, Jewish culture, and the European tradition.

Sara R. Horowitz, York University

‘There is talk of 700,000 Jews killed in and around Poland. This number is not necessarily exaggerated,’ wrote Lucien Dreyfus on July 4, 1942. In this extraordinary diary, Dreyfus, an Alsatian Jew who found refuge in Nice, reported about his daily life in Vichy France; commented on the BBC broadcasts, the rumors, or the political and military developments as recorded in the official local press; and noted many of his thoughts. The publication of this diary provides a unique testimony on the life of the Jewish community as well as on the Alsatian refugees in a French city during World War II.

Renée Poznanski, emerita, Ben Gurion University of the Negev