Origins of a Family Legacy
Emmanuel Carrère examines his family history in his latest memoir, Kolkhoz, which chronicles the life of his mother, Hélène Carrère. Hélène passed away in 2023 at the age of 94. Her public standing was significant as the perpetual secretary of the Académie Française. During her memorial at Les Invalides, President Macron recognized her lifetime of work. Her son’s 400-page account, translated by John Lambert, serves as a personal attempt to reconcile with his past and honor the woman who shaped his world.
Hélène’s background was anything but ordinary. She grew up as a stateless person in Paris. Her father, Georges Zourabichvili, was a Georgian refugee, and her mother, Nathalie von Pelken, descended from Russian aristocracy. The family structure changed abruptly in 1944 when Georges died at the hands of partisans who accused him of Nazi collaboration. Hélène was only 15. She carried the weight of this secret, attempting to shield her younger brother, Nicolas, from the reality of their father’s violent end.
The Shaping of a Life
Hélène was driven by an intense ambition. She gravitated toward history, specifically Russian studies, after briefly exploring acting. Her charm and intellect were notable. In one unusual episode, an Afghan pilot on a flight from Tashkent to Paris diverted the plane to Kabul. He held her there for four days before US aid workers managed to rescue her. She later married Louis Carrère, an insurance professional who spent long stretches of time traveling for his work.
The domestic environment they built was unconventional. Hélène’s influence led the children to sleep near her bed, a domestic arrangement she referred to as a kolkhoz. This term, borrowed from collective farms in the USSR, reflected her desire for communal closeness. There was no radio or television. Instead, the home was filled with literature. Her son, Emmanuel, read Dostoevsky by age 13. He formed a deep, emotional attachment to his mother, often writing her long, distraught letters when she was away.
Conflict and Reconciliation
Tension grew within the household when Hélène began receiving private phone calls from a man identified only as Mr N. The discovery of this affair devastated her husband, Louis. He withdrew from the marriage, eventually moving into a separate, tiny room in the house. The distance between Hélène and Louis persisted for decades, long after the affair ended. Their communication became infrequent and strained. Hélène’s preference for order and her ability to compartmentalize were central to these domestic dynamics.
Publicly, the relationship between mother and son remained complex. A significant breach occurred when Emmanuel published A Russian Novel. The book disclosed the details of Georges Zourabichvili’s death, a subject Hélène had explicitly forbidden him to cover. She viewed the family history as her domain alone. While they eventually moved past the disagreement, their divergent views on Russia continued to cause friction. Hélène maintained a positive view of Vladimir Putin as a rational leader even shortly before the invasion of Ukraine. Emmanuel took a different path, traveling to Georgia and Ukraine to witness the consequences of the conflict firsthand.
A Final Accounting
The memoir offers a window into the author’s own struggles, including his battles with bipolar disorder and the realities of his adult life. Carrère documents his drinking bouts and his relationships with raw honesty. He approaches his writing with a sense of purpose, though he admits to uncertainty about the final outcome. The title of the book, Kolkhoz, evokes the closed world of his childhood, a world that was as suffocating as it was formative.
At the end of her life, Hélène was tasked with completing the Académie dictionary, a massive project she managed for four decades. She was still working when she moved into a palliative care home, telling her husband she was merely leaving for a conference. Her legacy remains tied to her intellectual rigor and the complex family dynamics she navigated. The book stands as a tribute to her life and a record of the secrets that define every family history.