10. Après Holocaust
Perra, Emiliano
10. Après Holocaust - 2017.
67
After “Holocaust”This article explores the representation of the Holocaust in Italian and French television miniseries, made-for-TV films and docufictions that have aired since the 1979 broadcast of the miniseries Holocaust. Most of the works discussed in this article have one underlying theme: the relationship between France and Italy and the Holocaust. This is reflected in a series of conceptual pairings, such as guilt and innocence, collaboration and resistance, rescue and callousness, the state and the people. In other words, while many of the works discussed here talk about the Holocaust, they are really about France and Italy. While they are set in the not-so-distant past, they refer to present notions of national identity, in other words, French-ness and Italian-ness. However, there is one major difference between the two countries. France has displayed a sort of synergy between historiographical debate and televised representation that constitutes what I characterize as a ’nuanced’ trend. That is to say that French responsibility for the persecution and deportation of the Jews is acknowledged in shows such as 93, rue Lauriston, Hôtel du Parc and recently, Un Village français. In contrast, an analysis of Italian Holocaust-related TV narratives reveals little of the above. In fact, the opposite trend is at work. The main development has been the rise of a pernicious revisionism aimed at leveling the differences between Fascism and anti-Fascism and at presenting all sections of the Italian state as substantially innocent vis-à-vis the Holocaust. As a result, Italy’s Holocaust discourse, as it is presented in the popular medium of television, casts the country apart from its Western partners.
10. Après Holocaust - 2017.
67
After “Holocaust”This article explores the representation of the Holocaust in Italian and French television miniseries, made-for-TV films and docufictions that have aired since the 1979 broadcast of the miniseries Holocaust. Most of the works discussed in this article have one underlying theme: the relationship between France and Italy and the Holocaust. This is reflected in a series of conceptual pairings, such as guilt and innocence, collaboration and resistance, rescue and callousness, the state and the people. In other words, while many of the works discussed here talk about the Holocaust, they are really about France and Italy. While they are set in the not-so-distant past, they refer to present notions of national identity, in other words, French-ness and Italian-ness. However, there is one major difference between the two countries. France has displayed a sort of synergy between historiographical debate and televised representation that constitutes what I characterize as a ’nuanced’ trend. That is to say that French responsibility for the persecution and deportation of the Jews is acknowledged in shows such as 93, rue Lauriston, Hôtel du Parc and recently, Un Village français. In contrast, an analysis of Italian Holocaust-related TV narratives reveals little of the above. In fact, the opposite trend is at work. The main development has been the rise of a pernicious revisionism aimed at leveling the differences between Fascism and anti-Fascism and at presenting all sections of the Italian state as substantially innocent vis-à-vis the Holocaust. As a result, Italy’s Holocaust discourse, as it is presented in the popular medium of television, casts the country apart from its Western partners.
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