Army of Shadows

<p>Originally published in Algiers in 1943 Joseph Kessel’s <em>Army of Shadows</em> is one of the first books to have been written about the French Resistance. Now available in paperback Contra Mundum Press is proud to present the first new translation in over 70 years and the first edition since Jean-Pierre Melville’s iconic 1969 film.</p><p> </p><p>“What then when it comes to recounting the story of France an obscure secret France which is new to its friends its enemies and new especially to itself? France no longer has bread wine fire. But mainly it no longer has any laws. Civil disobedience individual or organized rebellion have become duties to the fatherland. The national hero is the clandestine man the outlaw. Nothing about the order imposed by the enemy and by the Marshal is valid. Nothing counts. Nothing is true any more. One changes home name every day. Officials and police officers are helping insurgents. One finds accomplices even in ministries. Prisons getaways tortures bombings scuffles. One dies and kills as if it’s natural. France lives bleeds in all its depths. It is toward the shadow that its true and unknown face is turned. In the catacombs of revolt people create their own light and find their own law. Never has France waged a nobler and more beautiful war than in the basements where it prints its free newspapers in its nocturnal lands and in its secret coves where it received its free friends and from where its children set out in torture cells where despite tongs red-hot pins and crushed bones the French died as free men.”</p>