Name: Charlotte
Rating: 4.307692307692307 (13 reviews)
ISBN: 9781782117964

David Foenkinos

Sam Taylor

Charlotte

louane

Lucy 

Two artists, two obsessions. Charlotte Salomon--born in pre-World War II Berlin to a Jewish family traumatized by suicide--was obsessed with art, and with living. She attended school in Germany until it was too dangerous to remain, fled to France, and was interned in a bleak work camp from which she narrowly escaped. Newly free, she spent two years in almost total solitude, creating a series of autobiographical pictures--images, words, even musical scores--which together tell her life story. The result is a unique, relentlessly complete artistic expression. In 1943, a pregnant Charlotte was taken to Auschwitz and gassed, but not before she entrusted her life's work to a friend, who kept it safe until peacetime. Entitled Life? Or Theatre?, it was exhibited in fragments in the 1960s; a 1998 exhibition of the complete work in the London Royal Academy became a sensation and eventually published in book form. David Foenkinos, himself obsessed with Charlotte, has written his own utterly original tribute to her tragic life and transcendent art. His novel is the result of a long-cherished desire to pay tribute to this young artist. Written with passion, life, humor, and intelligent observation, Charlotte, with rights sold in 12 countries and over 500,000 copies in print in France, is a triumph of creative expression, a monument to genius stilled too soon, and an ode to the will to survive.

A Novel

Patrick Book

This is one of the most beautiful and best novels I’ve ever read. Vonnegut prized economy of words in his writing, insisting that every sentence should advance the story and give the reader something to grasp. I have never seen that concept executed so strongly and flawlessly and poetically. This is heartbreaking and moving and all that stuff.

Ce roman retrace la vie de Charlotte Salomon, artiste peintre morte à vingt-six ans alors qu'elle était enceinte. Après une enfance à Berlin marquée par une tragédie familiale, Charlotte est exclue progressivement par les nazis de toutes les sphères de la société allemande. Elle vit une passion amoureuse fondatrice, avant de devoir tout quitter pour se réfugier en France. Exilée, elle entreprend la composition d'une oeuvre picturale autobiographique d'une modernité fascinante. Se sachant en danger, elle confie ses dessins à son médecin en lui disant : "C'est toute ma vie." Portrait saisissant d'une femme exceptionnelle, évocation d'un destin tragique, Charlotte est aussi le récit d'une quête. Celle d'un écrivain hanté par une artiste, et qui part à sa recherche.

Chaya Vervaecke

amazing read. I enjoyed it a lot mostly because it's an easy read and extremely well-written but also because the story is touching.
It is set in Germany during the interbellum and the second world war. 
Charlotte is one of the best "characters" i've read about. 
If I had to point one thing it'd be that some parts are kind of too long but it really doesn't affect the book too much;

Obsessed with art, and with living, Charlotte attended school in Germany until it was too dangerous to remain, fled to France, and was interned in a bleak work camp from which she narrowly escaped. Newly free, she spent two years in almost total solitude, creating a series of autobiographical art—images, words, even musical scores—that together tell her life story. A pregnant Charlotte was killed in Auschwitz at the age of 26, but not before she entrusted her life's work to a friend, who kept it safe until peacetime. The result, an extraordinary novel avant la lettre, was eventually published as Life? or Theatre? (and now reissued by Overlook), a unique, relentlessly complete artistic expression.In Charlotte, David Foenkinos—with passion, life, humor, and intelligent observation—has written his own utterly original tribute to Charlotte Salomon's tragic life and transcendent art. His gorgeous, haunting, and ultimately redemptive novel is the result of a long-cherished desire to honor this young artist. Infused with the emotion of a writer who connects deeply with his subject, and masterfully and sensitively translated by Sam Taylor, Charlotte is a triumph of creative expression, a monument to genius stilled too soon, and an ode to the will to survive.

Ju Berny

Mae 

Samuel Gagnon 

Benjamin Oertel

Charlotte Salomon was born into a family stricken by suicide and a country at war - but there is something exceptional about her. She has a gift, a talent for painting. And she has a great love, for a brilliant, eccentric musician. But just as she is coming in to her own as an artist, death is coming to control her country. The Nazis have come to power and, a Jew in Berlin, her life is narrowing - she is kept from her art, torn from her love and her family, chased from her country. And still she is not safe, not from the madness that has hunted her family, or the one gripping Europe ...

Charlotte

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