The History of the Era

Beautiful Riddle is more than a story of the ultra glamorous fashion industry of the Fifties. It is a recounting of some of the most important history of the era. While Suzy was busy modeling, Pitou was striving to create a career for himself as a journalist at Paris Match. His relationships with the heads of the French press and the assignments given to him, particularly as a war correspondent in Algeria as France attempted to hang on to its African colony, gave him a perspective on the politics of one of the first resource wars of the Twentieth Century, and why it failed.

Ike and Mamie were in the White House. Charles de Gaulle was in the Elysee Palace. And Ronald Reagan was selling Chesterfields. How the world has changed, you say. Yet, in the mid Fifties, events were very similar to those of today. We had much to learn by observing France's war for Algeria. But the opportunity was missed. As you read Beautiful Riddle, you will sit on the shoulders of a man who observed, first hand, the events and repercussions of a conflict that should have given us pause before embarking upon the similar catastrophes of Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.

To read a chapter on the Algerian War, scroll to the bottom of the page and
click on the insignia of the 3rd R.E. I. ( 3e Régiment étranger d'infanterie )