Au Revoir Britannia

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About the Book: 

Demons had been let loose, xenophobia and racism legitimised...

But was it, in fact, the European Union that was the root of the referendum defeat, or was it a convenient and obvious scapegoat? Ironically, the day following, ‘EU’ was the most searched term on the internet. What was this institution that they had just decided to leave? Many people had, in fact, no idea.

au revoir: (French)

goodbye for the present; until we see each other again.

Britannia: (Latin)

a province of the Roman Empire to the north of Gaul.

Is it goodbye to the eu forever for Britain?

Has the good ship Albion sailed into an oblivion of its own making?

From her unique perspective as former French ambassador to the UK, Sylvie Bermann examines the mistruths told by politicians surrounding the fateful 2016 Brexit referendum. Au Revoir Britannia asks the question ‘How did this happen?’ and exposes what she sees as the ‘unrepenting’ and ‘inveterate’ lies of the now pm, Boris Johnson. This first English edition includes a new preface exploring the future of post-Brexit Europe and Britain, and the uncertain implications of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Reviews: 

One of the most distinctive and thoughtful accounts anywhere of the culpable fiasco that is Brexit. [An] exasperated, affectionate lament. SCOTTISH REVIEW

A zippy insider’s take on the Brexit wars. THE NEW EUROPEAN

Reading Au Revoir Britannia is a strange, troubling and almost schizophrenic experience. This account of the Brexit years by Sylvie Bermann, the former French ambassador to Britain at the time of the EU referendum, is often laugh out loud funny – she has a gift for subtle but acidic putdowns; it’s insidery; it’s gossipy – but it’s also like reliving a nightmare you’d started to forget. THE HERALD

About the Author:

SYLVIE BERMANN is a career diplomat and was the French ambassador to the United Kingdom between 2014 and 2017. She grew up in Lyon, and studied history at Paris-Sorbonne and then specialised in oriental languages. Later she studied at the Beijing Language and Culture University, where she had her first taste of diplomacy as a closely monitored exchange student after the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976. She became the first female French ambassador to China in 2011. She was Director for the United Nations, International Organisations, Human Rights and Francophonie from 2005 to 2011. She also became the ambassador for France in Russia in 2017, before she retired from the French foreign ministry in 2020. In July 2021 she was appointed by OSCE as a mediator and coordinator of the political branch of the trilateral contact group in charge of the implementation of the Minsk agreement on Donbas.

COLIN McINTOSH, a UK national, is a retired lawyer and translator currently living in France. Born in Germany and raised in Scotland, he studied Law at the University of Edinburgh (LLB Hons) and the University of McGill in Canada (LLM). Soon after qualifying, he went to work at the Court of Justice of the European Communities in Luxembourg, first as Deputy Head of Personnel and then as part of a small team of lawyers undertaking background research for the judges. After five years, he moved to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris, working first in the Legal Affairs Section of the Nuclear Energy Agency and then, for many years, in the Translation Division. Here he combined translation and revision work with the duties of Registrar of the OECD’s Administrative Tribunal. Retired since 2011, he continues to take on occasional translation work and to follow British politics from afar.