Paige Bowers is the author of the new book The General's Niece: The Little-Known de Gaulle Who Fought to Free Occupied France, a biography of Geneviève de Gaulle, a World War II resistance fighter who was the niece of General Charles de Gaulle. Her work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Time magazine and USA Today. She teaches classes in French history and society for Louisiana State University Continuing Education.
Q: Why did you decide to write a biography of Geneviève de
Gaulle, and how much did you know about her before beginning your work on the
book?
A: I have a background as a freelance journalist, so I spent
a little more than 20 years looking for and writing interesting stories for
national magazines and newspapers.
Almost eight years ago, I decided to go back to graduate
school in history after a family trip to France. I had always enjoyed French
history, and Modern France became my area of focus.
But I’m ashamed to say that when I read the first volume of
General de Gaulle’s war memoirs, I breezed right past the page where he
dedicated the book to his niece, without giving much thought as to who she was
or why he might have paid tribute to her.
Q: How did you research her life, and what did you learn
that particularly surprised you?
A: I sifted through news articles, read her published
writings, listened to whatever interviews I could find, combed through her
archival holdings in Paris and interviewed people who knew her.
I don’t know if I was necessarily surprised by anything I
learned about her, but I do know that I was endlessly fascinated by her life.
For example, we often hear about her uncle’s June 18, 1940 radio address where
he implores the French not to give up the fight.
I had no idea that Geneviève and her family were in exodus
from the incoming Germans on that day, and that they found out about the
discourse from a priest who ran out to the swarm of people telling them that a
young general just spoke on the BBC and asked them not to give up hope.
That general was 19-year-old Geneviève’s uncle and his words
inspired her and so many others to press on and do something for France. Not
all of us have uncles like this, but then again not all of us respond to calls
like this in the way that she did.
Her commitment to France and her survival in the concentration
camps were formative experiences that shaped all of her future involvement
after the war.
Q: What was the relationship like between her and her famous
uncle, Charles de Gaulle?
A: Geneviève and her uncle were very close, in part because
he was a tremendous confidante and comfort to her when she needed to talk. She
could talk to her uncle in a way that she could not always talk to her deeply
sensitive father, and she knew that she could trust him with her confidences.
Charles, for his part, saw a bit of himself in his niece. He
respected her for her intelligence and bravery, and would seek out her opinions
on things from time to time. So there was a great foundation of love, trust and
respect between them and I think it empowered them both to pursue the things
they felt were right and just for France.
Q: You write, "Geneviève de Gaulle Anthonioz never
considered herself a hero or a saint, though she was called both of those
things in her lifetime." What is her legacy today?
A: In May 2015, she was symbolically interred in the
Panthéon with three other resisters as a reminder that we should not be
indifferent when the world around us changes in a way that is unacceptable.
Her story is really about the choices we make when faced
with such a change. Do we sit back and do nothing? Or, do we do as she did, and
decide to do something about the challenges we face?
Her desire to do something, even when her life was in
danger, or the road was uncertain, continued after the war until her death. She
served the women who were deported and interred like her, and who needed help
rebuilding their lives after the war.
She bore witness to the horrors she faced in a concentration
camp so that the world could know and never forget about what happened. And
later, she was a tremendous advocate for France’s poor, ensuring that their
rights were not ignored.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: Right now, I’m focused on telling people about The
General’s Niece. But I began researching a possible future book idea that I
became interested in after I met my manuscript deadline.
I’m not ready to go into detail about it yet, but it’s about
another really interesting Frenchwoman whose life crossed paths with a person I
wrote about in The General’s Niece. I’m sorry I can’t say more than that!
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: One of my favorite research memories was the afternoon I
interviewed the resisters Anise Postel-Vinay and Michèle Agniel. It was a wide-ranging interview where we talked
about their memories of wartime, their entry into the resistance, their
deportation to a concentration camp, their lives after the war, and their
memories of Geneviève de Gaulle.
Their stories were heartfelt, funny and brave and I felt so
fortunate to spend time in their presence. They are living history and national
treasures. I’ve carried them with me in my heart since that day we met and feel
a tremendous responsibility to them and to Geneviève de Gaulle and her family
to make sure that the stories of female resisters are well-told and not
forgotten.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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