The House of Fragile Things

A powerful history of Jewish art collectors in France, and how an embrace of art and beauty was met with hatred and destruction The depths of French anti-Semitism is the stunning subject that Mr. McAuley lays bare. . . . [He] tells this haunting saga in eloquent detail. As French anti-Semitism rises once again today, the effect is nothing less than chilling.Diane Cole, Wall Street Journal Elegantly written and deeply moving. . . . [A] haunting book.David Bell, New York Review of Books In the dramatic years between 1870 and the end of World War II, a number of prominent French Jewspillars of an embattled communityinvested their fortunes in Frances cultural artifacts, sacrificed their sons to the countrys army, and were ultimately rewarded by seeing their collections plundered and their families deported to Nazi concentration camps. In this rich, evocative account, James McAuley explores the central role that art and material culture played in the assimilation and identity of French Jews in the fin de sicle. Weaving together narratives of various figures, some familiar from the works of Marcel Proust and the diaries of Jules and Edmond Goncourtthe Camondos, the Rothschilds, the Ephrussis, the Cahens dAnversMcAuley shows how Jewish art collectors contended with a powerful strain of anti-Semitism: they were often accused of invading Frances cultural patrimony. The collections these families left behindmany ultimately donated to the French statewere their response, tragic attempts to celebrate a nation that later betrayed them.