INTIMATE INQUIRIES AND THE WOUNDS OF HISTORY

In Un mal irréparable [An Irreparable Wrong] (Mialet-Barrault), Lionel Duroy traces the fate of Frédéric Riegerl, a successful writer who, at the end of his life, uncovers the buried history of his family: the 1951 deportation of thousands of Romanians to the Bărăgan desert. This tragedy, long kept silent by his parents, has nonetheless shaped his identity without his knowing it. True to his art of exploring intimate wounds and the shadowy zones of memory, Duroy probes questions of inheritance, silence, and the truth owed to the living. In Les Voix de Iaşi [The Voices of Iași] (Noir sur Blanc), Jil Silberstein revisits the June 1941 massacre in Iași, Romania, where thirteen thousand Jews were murdered. The grandson of a native of the town, he conducts a sensitive and erudite investigation into the vanished Jewish community, weaving together archives, testimonies, and personal quest. Both authors explore how the traces of the past endure in family and collective destinies, seeking to understand how the traumas of History continue to shape the lives, voices, and memory of the living.

Moderator: Antoine Perraud, contributor to La Croix literary supplement.

Duration: 1 hour
Free entry, subject to availability