The Resistance Versus Vichy

"Vichy France, officially the French State (État français), was France during the regime of Marshal Philippe Pétain, during World War II, from the German victory in the Battle of France (July 1940) to the Allied liberation in August 1944. Following the defeat in June 1940, President Albert Lebrun appointed Marshal Pétain as Premier of France. After making peace with Germany, Pétain and his government voted to reorganize the discredited Third Republic into an authoritarian regime."--Wikipedia.

"Vichy France, officially the French State (État français), was France during the regime of Marshal Philippe Pétain, during World War II, from the German victory in the Battle of France (July 1940) to the Allied liberation in August 1944. Following the defeat in June 1940, President Albert Lebrun appointed Marshal Pétain as Premier of France. After making peace with Germany, Pétain and his government voted to reorganize the discredited Third Republic into an authoritarian regime."--Wikipedia.

This book, first published in 1985, examines various aspects of the intellectual achievements of writers and artists in the Vichy period; a strong emphasis on the ambiguity of much of their work emerges from the research. It goes a long way in answering the question of what it was like living under the fascist Vichy regime, and what the collaborators and resistance thought about their purpose and patriotism.

During 1940-1944, the citizens of France and its Empire endured the 'dark years' of invasion, persecution and foreign occupation. Thousands of men, women and children suffered arrest, deportation and death as the French Vichy regime worked to secure a place for France in Hitler's New Order. France in the Second World War is a wide-ranging yet succinct introduction to the French experience of the Second World War and its aftermath. It examines the fall of France in 1940 and the founding of the Vichy regime, as well as collaboration, resistance, everyday life, the Holocaust, the Liberation and the echoes of the period in contemporary France. Chris Millington addresses the chief topics in chapters that synthesizes the key points of the history and the historiography. The French Empire is carefully integrated throughout, illustrating the global impact of events on mainland France. In addition, Millington provides a helpful glossary of terms, personalities and movements from the period and an annotated bibliography of English-language sources to guide students to the most relevant works in the area. France in the Second World War provides a comprehensive introduction to the history and historiography of France and its Empire during their darkest hours.

Uncompromising, often startling, meticulously documented—this book is an account of the government, and the governed, of colaborationist France. Basing his work on captured German archives and contemporary materials rather than on self-serving postwar memoirs or war-trial testimony, Professor Paxton maps out the complex nature of the ill-famed Vichy government, showing that it in fact enjoyed mass participation. The majority of the Frenchmen in 1940 feared social disorder as the worse imaginable evil and rallied to support the State, thereby bringing about the betrayal of the Nation as a whole.

One of the distinctive features of the "Vichy Syndrome"?the persistence of the memory of the Vichy regime in French political and cultural life?is that it has been extremelyødifficult for an authoritative historical discourse to impose itself. Why does Vichy, and all that the name entails, fascinate and even obsess the French, inflecting not only discussions of the past but of the present as well? In Vichy's Afterlife, Richard J. Golsan explores the complexities of some of the most provocative episodes of Vichy's curious persistence in France's national consciousness. He argues that each of these episodes, events, and scandals constitutes a crossroads where history and "counterhistory"?different or competing versions of the past?encounter one another, often with explosive and even destructive consequences.

Critical acclaim for Sisters in the Resistance "Often moving . . . always fascinating . . . women in the FrenchResistance is a key subject. Margaret Weitz has gathered personaltestimonies . . . and set them in an intelligible context thathelps us understand how all French people--men andwomen--experienced the Nazi occupation." --Robert Paxton, MellonProfessor of Social Sciences, Columbia University, and author ofVichy France: Old Guard and New Order, 1940-1944. "Compulsive reading . . . a valuable book which vividly portraysthe intricacies of resistance within France, written in an easy butserious style." --Times Literary Supplement (London). "An absolutely stunning and compelling chronicle of dauntlesscourage and unflagging patriotism." --Booklist. "[Margaret Collins Weitz's] well-researched, thoughtful study. . .has filled a gap in the history of World War II." --PublishersWeekly. "Balancing absorbing narrative and astute analysis, MargaretCollins Weitz has integrated the unsung achievements of women intothe history of the French Resistance." --Carole Fink, Professor ofHistory, The Ohio State University, and author of Marc Bloch: ALife in History. "Fifty years after the end of World War II, Sisters in theResistance renders homage to the courageous women of the FrenchResistance. It is high time for their contributions to be fullyacknowledged, and fortunate indeed that they have found such asympathetic, scholarly, and lucid chronicler in Margaret CollinsWeitz." --Marilyn Yalom, author of Blood Sisters: The FrenchRevolution in Women's Memory.

Proposes a new interpretation of French collaboration during the Second World War, placing Fascist Italy at centre stage.