« Réponse au questionnaire de Luc Estang sur les écrivains mobilisés »

“From the very first days of the war, initiatives multiplied to provide books for soldiers (…) But what are our soldiers reading? We sent the following questionnaire to a number of young mobilized writers: Did you bring books with you, and do you receive them? Which ones? What were your reasons for choosing them? What is being read around you? (…) Do you share your favorite authors with your comrades? To receive questions for a literary survey! What a gentle reminder of a time we have lost!”

Troyat lists the books he brought: “Dostoevsky, so as to finish correcting the proofs of the book I devoted to that writer… Gide’s Journal, La Mousson (…), Mauriac’s Souffrances et bonheurs d’un chrétien… on the day of mobilization, I packed a few volumes likely to withstand the great disorder, that is all (…). Few books are read among the second lieutenants around me… there is a respectably stocked library for the garrison, but mostly of historical and military works…”

As for what his comrades are reading, he has the impression “that pre-war books, I mean before 1938–1939, seem to be in demand… what mobilized men need is either a brutal displacement in time, or, on the contrary, a sincere reflection of the days they have been living since last September. With this in mind, I have finished a novel that begins on the day of mobilization, entitled Judith Madrier. The book is to appear first in Candide, then with Plon.”

An interesting document.