Twilight of the Belle Époque: The Paris of Picasso, Stravinsky, Proust, Renault, Marie Curie, Gertrude Stein, and Their Friends through the Great War by Mary McAuliffe (review)

Reviews 239 rate since 1985. Following the introduction, however, their demonstration becomes more problematic. They establish regional differences based on historical distinctions between complex and simple families, egalitarian/non-egalitarian transmission of patrimony, and rural/non-rural habitat. The anthropology of religious practice also figures prominently in their argument; while Catholicism has ceased to have importance for the French, a‘catholicisme zombie’continues to exhibit importance in those regions where it was once dominant, such as Bretagne, as seen in levels of educational achievement or in the percentage of women in the workforce. They make an unconvincing try to prove that longstanding traditions in family structure and historical religious practice continue to influence presidential elections or levels of educational attainment in France today. Their methodology is at times questionable; in their distinction between the population living in towns or cities and those in rural areas, they use the figures provided by Frédéric Le Play in 1876 as their primary reference to l’habitat groupé, rather than more contemporary sources. They also use questionable statistics in their analysis of simple and complex families (in the latter, two generations share the same habitat). Complex families are found, on the average, in only 0.57% of families in France in the 1999 census; however, Todd and Le Bras judge a region where the percentage of complex families averages 1.8 to indicate a substantial distinction between simple and complex families. Their amplification of small statistical differences is disconcerting. Their analysis of anthropological structures and religious practice over time has as a goal to show that the influence of the past is more important than political or economic changes over recent years.As a corollary, rather than adapt a strategy of “l’adaptation à la contrainte extérieure”(305), the government of France should be aware of the anthropological diversity of the French population.“Jamais les élites de ce pays ne semblent conscientes de l’autonomie et de l’inertie des mentalités qui constituent le cœur de la vie sociale et définissent l’axe de l’histoire” (306). They seem to argue that France is an exceptional case and one should not allow globalization or the European Union to dictate policy. The laborious discussions of famille simple/ complexe, héritage égalitaire/inégalitaire, and other anthropological and demographic data provide little insight into France’s current political,economic,and social situation. Davidson College (NC) Homer B. Sutton McAuliffe, Mary. Twilight of the Belle Époque: The Paris of Picasso, Stravinsky, Proust, Renault, Marie Curie, Gertrude Stein, and Their Friends through the Great War. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014. ISBN 978-1-4422-2163-5. $29.95. In this sequel to Dawn of the Belle Époque: The Paris of Monet, Zola, Bernhardt, Eiffel, Debussy, Clemenceau, and Their Friends (2011) which covered 1870–1900, McAuliffe again demonstrates her mastery of a vast amount of diverse material. As noted in my review of the first volume (FR 85.6), telling the stories of so many people representing such a variety of disciplines year by year comes at a price—especially when, in this case,“friends”Debussy, Ravel, Isadora Duncan, Matisse, Bernhardt, and Rodin garner every bit as much attention as the figures singled out in the book’s title, and when they are accompanied by an even larger cast of secondary players including Citroën, de Gaulle, Zola, Braque, the Michelin brothers, the Boulanger sisters, Diaghilev, Satie, Cocteau, Coty, Chanel, and Apollinaire. McAuliffe relies heavily on transitional statements which make events seem more coincidental than they surely were; these range from the innocuous—“Meanwhile, back in Paris” (66)—to the more obtrusive and sometimes unintentionally humorous:“While Rodin was brooding on his inability to impress his fellow Frenchmen, Isadora Duncan was reveling in her growing success” (70);“While Debussy and Emma Bardac were on the brink of shedding their respective spouses, Marie and her beloved husband, Pierre Curie, were hard at work”(82);“While [Bernhardt’s grandchildren] gorged on cakes, businessmen throughout Paris were finding new and better ways for making money” (203). Another holdover from the first volume is McAuliffe’s habit of planting“teases”just before turning to someone or something else...