Shortly after France’s liberation from Nazi Germany in 1944, Jean-Paul Sartre declared, “Never were we freer than under the Occupation.” This might well have been true for French existentialists during the war years, but not so much for millions of their compatriots simply trying to exist. Over the course of five weeks, we will explore the many ways in which the French responded to the material as well as the moral and even existential challenges of life between 1940 and 1944. Among the texts we will read and discuss will be Vercors’ The Silence of the Sea and Irène Némirovsky’s Suite Française, as well as Pierre Sauvage’s documentary film “Weapons of the Spirit.” Of course, while this class will focus on the past, one task of historians is to offer possible parallels between then and now.

Tuesdays | 5 weeks | 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM
February 4
February 11
February 18
February 25
March 4

In person and simulcast