The interconnections between histories and memories of the Holocaust, colonialism and extreme violence in post-war French and Francophone fiction and film provide the central focus of this book.

Proposes a new model for understanding cultural memory based on the principle of the palimpsest which condenses different memory traces. Challenges the distinction between memories of the Holocaust and memories of colonialism. Offers new readings of familiar post-war novels and films according to this new model of palimpsestic memory. Challenges the distinction between a formal aesthetics and politics by proposing a model which is a combination of the two.