Passing Misery: The Journal of a Forced Laborer in the Third Reich

The Service du Travail Obligatoire (STO), or the Compulsory Work Service, program remains one of the most unsettling features of France’s history in World War II. Established by the Vichy government in 1943, this initiative saw young men provide forced labor, primarily within France or Germany, in support of the Third Reich’s war effort. In this illuminating translation of the journal of Jean Louis Mary Pasquiers, a former teacher and forced laborer from Paris, Passing Misery documents Pasquiers’ life within war-torn Europe, in unwilling service to the Nazi regime. By exploring Pasquiers’ personal story, this book offers an unrivalled insight into the complexities of war-time collaboration, resistance, and moral culpability, shedding light on one of the darkest chapters in European history.

Rebecca L. Thompson is the Chair of Modern Languages at St. Joseph’s Collegiate Institute in Buffalo, New York. She holds a PhD in Literature with a focus in Translation Studies from the University of Texas and specializes in leftist and oppositional translation theories, collaboration and culpability in Vichy and Occupied France, and contemporary Francophone literature. Her recent publications include the translation, Little Wet-Paint Girl (Athabasca University Press, 2022).