Priscilla: The Hidden Life of an Englishwoman in Wartime France by Nicholas Shakespeare is a transcendent work of narrative nonfiction in the vein of The Hare with Amber Eyes.
When Nicholas Shakespeare stumbled across a trunk full of his late aunt’s personal belongings, he was unaware of where this discovery would take him and what he would learn about her hidden past. The glamorous, mysterious … past. The glamorous, mysterious figure he remembered from his childhood was very different from the morally ambiguous young woman who emerged from the trove of love letters, journals and photographs, surrounded by suitors and living the precarious existence of a British citizen in a country controlled by the enemy during World War II.
As a young boy, Shakespeare had always believed that his aunt was a member of the Resistance and had been tortured by the Germans. The truth turned out to be far more complicated.
Piecing together fragments of his aunt’s remarkable and tragic story, Priscilla is at once a stunning story of detection, a loving portrait of a flawed woman trying to survive in terrible times, and a spellbinding slice of history.
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A remarkable story, a riveting family biography of a mysterious late aunt, Priscilla. A loving portrait of a flawed woman.
In his book Priscilla, The Hidden Life of an Englishwoman in Wartime France the English novelist Nicholas Shakespeare takes up the subject of family history. The title character, Priscilla, was Shakespeare’s aunt. Throughout the first decades of his life, she was to him and other family members a mysterious, glamorous figure, with a hint of …
Somewhat sad regarding the disruption of a life during war.
This book was hard to get into, and didn’t really provide much information that was interesting or edifying. It could’ve been written in a much more fascinating way and held the interest of the reader better. I was expecting something a lot more interesting and fun.
This book is a dreary slog about the (largely speculative) activities of a British woman in Nazi-occupied Paris. A dispiriting waste of time.
Interesting
It was ok
Priscilla is a sad, tragic story of a young woman caught in France at the outbreak of war. As a British citizen, she was considered an enemy in German occupied France. Priscilla has to rely on her guile to survive. She makes decisions that are haunting and difficult. The outcome is tragic and sad. Her nephew unearths her story and reveals the life …
Was to drawn out.
This is a historical book based on letters, records and recollections of people who knew the author’s aunt during WWII. It’s both amazing and sad the things she had to do to get through the war and stay out of prison camps. I don’t know that it would be much different than what we might choose in her place. She led a checkered life and survived …