Speaker: Julian Jackson
Topic: The Trial of Marshal Pétain
Venue: Vinson Lecture Theatre
Time: 15:30-16:30 Saturday 16 September
Talk Summary:
The three-week trial of Marshal Pétain, France’s greatest hero of the Great War and the victor of Verdun, acts as a lens through which to examine the central crises of twentieth-century French history – the defeat of 1940, the signing of the armistice and Vichy’s policy of collaboration with the Nazis – what Pétain’s main prosecutor André Mornet called ‘four years to erase from our history’. Julian Jackson, the leading authority on modern French history, examines in forensic detail this intense moment in France’s reckoning with its past, and considers its legacy today.
Julian Jackson is Professor Emeritus of Modern French History at Queen Mary, University of London and the foremost authority in his field. His biography of Charles de Gaulle, A Certain Idea of France, met with universal acclaim. His latest book is France on Trial: the Case of Marshal Pétain.