The Bugatti Queen

Recall my reviews of books about "progressive" women of the early twentieth century (such as the novel about Tina Modotti, "Tinisima" by Eleana Poniatowsa), and add to them the Bugatti Queen, Helle Nice. This biography tells the story of a girl from rural France, born in 1900, who finds her way to Paris, becomes a night club performer, and professional dancer, but who has always wanted to become a race car driver. Her career picks up, she makes friends with all the right people (in all the wrong ways, perhaps) and then has an accident which destroys her knee and her dancing career.

Not to be held down, this gives her the chance to really concentrate on the still new (and very dangerous) sport of auto racing, something that few women were involved with. She sees an extraordinarily high percentage of her male peers killed in racing accidents, but she becomes the toast of racing circles in (at least) France, her fame and ambition growing. Until she, too, is in a racing accident, this time in South America, which leads to a long recovery, and to an end to her highflying career as a driver (although she does not stop participating in the sport).

Cut to Paris in WWII, and the German occupation. Now, Nice's activities grow mysterious, as evidence of them does not seem to exist. She is living with her latest lover (and mechanic, a much younger man) in Paris, but they move to the Riviera where they live in elegant surroundings in a villa overlooking the sea. The war ends, the Germans vanish, and life goes on. But within a few years, Nice finds herself in a restaurant in Monaco where the runs into another well known French racer, named Louis Chiron, who loudly and publically accused her of being an agent of the Gestapo. The run-in is reported, and obviously was meaningful, because Nice drops from public view.

Was she a Gestapo informer? Was she a Nazi? Was she anything?

Again, the evidence one way or another appears to be non-existent. Nice lives almost another 40 years. But she lives them in poverty, loneliness and obscurity.

As a subject of a biography, she is interesting. Her story has never before been written and there are obvious gaps in it. (The author, Miranda Seymour, includes an Afterwood, where she talks about how she came to write this book, and how she obtained the information contained in it.) It ends in mystery.

Most importantly, in addition to the biography of the subject, is the description of the early days of automobile racing, especially in Europe. Fascinating.