Sarah's Key, Tatiana de Rosnay

Sarah’s Key

By Tatiana de Rosnay

(Tansley Reads Rating: 78% -- winner for the year)

 

Ice-Breaker:

Sarah’s Key is a form of historical fiction (despite the author’s declaration that it is not).  Do you enjoy this type of work?  Why?  How and when can a powerful piece of fiction be a history lesson in itself?

Questions:

1.               Julia discovers disturbing events concerning French collaboration with the Nazis during the war.  Having read this book, did you learn of any historical events you previously did not know about?  Which one struck you the most?

2.               Sarah’s Key is composed of two interweaving story lines: Sarah’s, in the past and Julia’s quest in the present day. What did you like or dislike about the way each story was told?  Did you enjoy the alternating stories and time-frames?  What are the strengths or drawbacks of this format?

3.               Which “voice” did you prefer:  Sarah’s or Julia’s?  Why?  Is one more or less authentic that the other?  If you could meet either of the two characters, which one would you choose?

4.               How does the apartment on la rue de Saintonge unite the past and present action – and all the characters – in Sarah’s Key?  How would you feel about living in such a place?  Do you think “walls remember”?

5.               What different feelings does Sarah experience throughout the trauma of the round-up and its aftermath?  How do you think you would have reacted as a ten-year old?

6.               How do you think you would have reacted as one of the French citizens in the surrounding community:  a)  the women trying to provide bread to the children on the street, and later through the fence; b)  the policeman who helped Sarah escape; c)  the concierge women; d)  the elderly couple (Jules and Genevieve) who raised Sarah?

7.               Why during the Jewish round up did some people try to help, and others did not?  Is it just that some are prejudiced, while other are not?  Or is there more going on here?

8.               Why do you think the people in “modern day” France do not care to know about what happened during World War II?(pg. 144)

9.               What was your perception of Julia’s character:  a) as a journalist; b) a wife; c) a mother;
d) an in-law?

10.            This novel is built around several family secrets.  What are these secrets? Was Julia right to go so far?  Is it sometimes better not to know?

(a)             As a reader, did you expect that William actually knew about his mother’s past?

11.            More on secrets:

(a)             Why do you think that William initially rejects the true story of his mother’s life?

(b)             Why do you think Sarah never told her family about her childhood?

12.            Why do you think that the author waits under p.132 and later p. 292 before she gives us Sarah’s name (title character and later Julia’s daughter)?

(a)             Were any of you surprised that the name of Julia’s baby would be Sarah?

13.            What do you imagine happens after the end of the novel? What do you think Julia’s life will be like now?  What has she learnt?

14.            [Supplementary – time permitting.]  We are taught, as young readers, that every story has a “moral”.  Is there a moral to Sarah’s Key?  What can we learn about our world – and ourselves – from Sarah’s story?

15.            Whether as a Jew remembering the Holocaust, and the Ralf du Vel d’Hiv, in particular, or as someone remembering the World Wars, generally, we are taught that we must “remember and never forget”.  This could apply to other events involving the treatment of people.  How do we as individuals in a modern society put this instruction into practice?