Forbidden Reading in Occupied Countries: Belgium and France, 1914-1918
(2015) Reading and the First World War — ISBN: [9781137443259], p. 227-241, published
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- For the population of Belgium and Northern France, World War One was above all an experience of living under military occupation. The multiplication of rules and prohibitions issued by the Government-General or, closer to the front, by the Etappen authorities, gave to the occupied the impression of living in an ‘open air prison’. The German military authorities paid a special attention to the flow of information. The occupied countries were isolated from the outside world and submitted to a heavy censorship. Most of the Belgian and French newspapers disappeared with the freedom of press, but were soon replaced by new ones, controlled by the occupier. However, this latter was opposed by improvised clandestine newspapers, flourishing during the two first years of the occupation. Their first goal was to spread amongst the occupied uncensored news, in order to restore their faith in the allied cause, but they quickly also formed an opinion press, wishing to give a voice to the occupied opinion, as well as to orientate it. Despite its decline during the second half of the war, this underground press took a special place in the Belgian national narrative during the interwar period. Nevertheless, other forms of clandestine writings had found their way in the occupied territories. Pamphlets, smuggled allied newspapers, songs and poetry responded discreetly to the needs of the occupied to keep themselves informed, to feed their thoughts about the situation, and also simply to relax through the means of humor and irony. But the most sensitive clandestine readings, both large-scale and very intimate, were made possible by the creation of clandestine networks smuggling hundreds of thousands letters between Belgian and French front soldiers and their relatives remained in occupied territories.
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Debruyne, E. (2015). Forbidden Reading in Occupied Countries: Belgium and France, 1914-1918. In S. Towheed & E.G.C. King (ed.), Reading and the First World War (p. p. 227-241). Plagrave Macmillan. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/243699