The Auschwitz victim who lives on through art

Charlotte by David Foenkinos (translated by Sam Taylor) won the Prix Renaudot and the Prix Goncourt des Lyceens. I actually have never heard of either award which probably shows my literary ignorance more than anything else.  However, it led me to an expectation of sorts. “Must be alright”, I thought. Still, I had read some award winning authors before that left me shaking my head in bemusement that anyone could actually read such a book.

That this is different becomes immediately apparent when you can’t help but notice that every line contains a complete sentence and paragraphs are rendered obsolete.  It took me quite a few pages to settle into its rhythm but by page 39 I became emotional when certain facts were laid out before my eyes. From then on it tormented my soul.  

With every page, the certainty of the end imbues itself upon your brain and the helplessness of the situation makes you want to reach out and offer some help…..but, of course, you can’t.  This happened decades ago and the story of the artist, Charlotte Salomon, has been told on stage and in writing before.

The torment of the Jews under Hitler gnaws at you; the hopelessness of it all; the disregard of humanity and yet, that part of her life was tacked onto the end of a traumatic childhood where suicides in the family were considered the norm.

There’s one quote below that sums up, for me, why I prefer non-fiction.

“I believe any work of art should reveal its author.
I mean, I have nothing against fiction.
But all that stuff is just entertainment.
And people need to be entertained.
It’s their way of not seeing the truth.”

It resonates throughout this book.

Though it’s listed in the pages as a novel, the underlying story and places are all true, as is the fact of Charlotte’s Jewishness which leads to so many awful things I could hardly stop shaking my head.  The optimists stayed and perished while the pessimists fled and the years of torment are so well documented but the tale is still poignant.

Suicides form a large part of Charlotte’s life also, infecting her character with different values and outlooks.  She is thus drawn into her art, arguably the only real thing that drives her constantly and the reason that today we get to hear about her and what the world lost.

Labelled by some as “genius” she was influenced by several artists, Munch being one of them and she left a large body of work from her time in France before a German named Brunner came to town.  In charge of Jewish extermination, he used to wear gloves all the time because he feared contamination by a Jew and when the war was over he escaped retribution by getting to Syria and changing his name although Mossad managed to disfigure him via a letter bomb.

Charlotte was never fated to be so lucky and the tragic end is detailed but her legacy, in the form of the paintings and an opera, live on, resurrected to a large degree by her father and stepmother who managed to escape the death camp they were sent to.

The book is concise, moves along well and is easy to understand; just don’t get put off by the one line sentences.  Definitely one I recommend.

Charlotte by David Foenkinos (translated by Sam Taylor) is available now from Dymocks. Click here to learn more.