About half a million anxious people left Paris in September 1939 after the declaration of war. Then a workaday calm reclaimed the city, as French propaganda continued playing in the key of imminent victory: the government, headed by the right-leaning Radical Edouard Daladier, convinced most of France that the Allies would be more than a match for the Wehrmacht. No doubt there were still Parisians who imagined they'd have to pack their bags and head out eventually - which they did, when the Phoney War ended in May 1940. In the meantime foreboding was blunted by a fatal propensity to look on the bright sight.

LRB 8 May 2008 | PDF Download