Claude Lanzmann's 'Le Lièvre de Patagonie': A Life Leading to Shoah

Claude Lanzmann's memoir 'Le Lièvre de Patagonie' (Éditions Gallimard) recounts his extraordinary life and the making of his film 'Shoah'. The book details the conception, years-long shooting, and struggles to complete the film, as well as Lanzmann's earlier engagements: resistance against Nazis and Vichy, anti-colonialism, support for Israel, physical exploits in Israeli tanks and planes, relationships with Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, and his work at 'Les Temps modernes'. Lanzmann argues that only writers and artists, unlike historians or philosophers, can truly confront evil by merging with the other's experience while remaining themselves. He describes three hostile reactions to 'Shoah' from Michel Polac, Rabbi Sirat, and Cardinal Lustiger, who refused to see the film. The book's title refers to a hare appearing in car headlights in Patagonia, which Lanzmann calls 'incarnation'—a moment of shared truth. Yet he also sees incarnation in the endless procession of executed and exterminated victims. Lanzmann, who says he loves existence 'madly', is without illusions about humanity, citing Goya's 'Duel with Cudgels' as illustrating each consciousness pursuing the other's death. He admits his own weaknesses and suggests that heroism may arise from shame.