Britain and France in Two World Wars: Truth, Myth and Memory

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Description

France and Britain, indispensable allies in two world wars, remember and forget their shared history in contrasting ways. The book examines key episodes in the relationship between the two countries, including the outbreak of war in 1914, the battles of the Somme and Verdun, the Fall of France in 1940, Dunkirk, and British involvement in the French Resistance and the 1944 Liberation. The contributors discuss how the two countries tend to forget what they owe to each other, and have a distorted view of history which still colours and prejudices their relationship today, despite government efforts to build a close political and military partnership.

Reviews

The contributions offer a vivid illustration of how the same event can yield sharply divergent memories in two neighbouring countries. -- Robert Boyce * www.histoire-politique.fr *
These essays are an excellent advertisement for comparative history: this approach sheds further light on the relationship between war and memory in both countries ... This collection demonstrates that approaches in military and diplomatic history can effectively incorporate elements of cultural history, and vice versa. -- Vincent Trott * Reviews in History *
These essays penned by experts in the field comprise a compelling whole, reminding us that the interaction between truth, myth and memory is complex and fascinating and even more so when the Franco-British relationship is involved. -- James E. Connolly * French History *
Robert Tombs is an expert on Franco-British relations both academically and personally ... he and research fellow Emile Chabal brought a Premier League Franco-British team to St Johns College Cambridge to discuss the Truth, Myth and Memory of the complex relationship between Britain and France in two world wars ... Britain and France is a good example how a group of historians can write good comparative history. -- Robert Gildea * Modern & Contemporary France *
The contributors offer new insights on Franco-British relations, past and present, on the way both countries viewed each other in 19141918 and 19391945, and how they have remembered those periods ... [They] go beyond the theme of a lovehate relationship, thus adding to Franco-British scholarship a comparative at times transnational history of France and Britains memory. -- Charlotte Faucher, Queen Mary University of London, UK * Contemporary French Civilization *
This volume is an immensely engaging and wide-ranging work of scholarship, with valuable and original insights into the Anglo-French experience and memory of both world wars. -- Heather Jones * The London School of Economics and Political Science *

Author Bio

Robert Tombs is Professor of French History at the University of Cambridge, UK. Emile Chabal is a Chancellors Fellow in History at the University of Edinburgh, UK.