This course aims to give students a solid grounding in Modern French History, and a detailed understanding of the chronology, events, trends and themes running from the Renaissance to the fall of General de Gaulle. Though primarily a political, diplomatic and military history of France in the 19th and 20th centuries, the course will not neglect the cultural, intellectual and socio-economic developments of the period. It will also seek to investigate the specificity – if any – of French history and to determine its significance within European and world history.
Prerequisites:
Previous study of history – particularly European – helpful but not essential
Learning outcomes:
By the end of the course students will be able to:
• Place, comprehend and contextualize the key events in Modern French History
• Identify thematic threads running through the course
• Display familiarity with the historiography of the subject
• Apply independent thought and critical analysis to the topics covered
• Understand the nature of historical study
Method of presentation:
Lecture (30-45 mins) and discussion (1h–45 mins) based on the lecture, preparatory reading, documents or case studies. One field trip is included.
Required work and form of assessment:
Class participation (20%); written assignment (20%); written mid-term exam (20%); written final exam (40%)
Written assignment: 2,500-word essay from a selection of 30-40 titles based on the class topics. Examples of possible topics include "Why did the Vichy Regime fail to attract grassroots support?"; "Explain the significance of Alsace-Lorraine in French historical mythology”; "On his deathbed, Louis XIV confessed that he had 'loved war too much' - what were the consequences for France?"; "How do you interpret De Gaulle's famous 'Je vous ai compris' during his June 1958 speech in Algiers?"
content:
Session 1: Introduction: The Making of Modern France (35,000 BC-15th Century AD)
Prehistory – The Gauls – The Roman invasion – Christianity – The Franks – Charlemagne – The Middle Ages – The Hundred Years’ War
Required readings:
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.1-19
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.3-14
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.6-45
2. The Renaissance and the Wars of Religion (15th-17th Centuries)
Art and science of the Renaissance – Francis I – The establishment of the French language – The Protestant Reformation – Henry IV – Richelieu – The Thirty Years’ War
Required readings:
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.86-141
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.46-64
3. The Sun King: Louis XIV (1661-1715)
The French attempt at European domination – The revocation of the Edict of Nantes – Louis as a patron of the arts – The court at Versailles
Required readings:
Dunlop, Ian, Louis XIV. London: Chatto & Windus, 1999. Pp.198-217, 265-283
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.142-172
Recommended readings:
Church, William F., The Greatness of Louis XIV. Myth or Reality? Boston: D.C. Heath and Company (1959)
4. Les Lumières: The French Enlightenment (18th Century)
The social, economic and political structures of the Ancien Régime – The reign of Louis XV – The Philosophes (Voltaire, Rousseau, Montesquieu, Diderot, D’Holbach etc.) – The impact of the French Enlightenment at home and abroad
Required readings:
Doyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002 (Second Edition). Pp.44-65
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.173-184
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.77-95
Recommended readings:
Goodman, Dena. The Republic of Letters: Cultural History of the French Enlightenment. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996
Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. Ancien Regime: History of France, 1610-1774. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 1998
5. “Oh! It’ll be fine”: The French Revolution (1789-1799)
The storming of the Bastille – Constitutional monarchy – Terror – The War in the Vendée – The Directory – The French Revolutionary Wars
Required readings:
Doyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002 (Second Edition). Pp.391-425
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.97-150
Recommended readings:
Chartier, Roger. The Cultural Origins of the French Revolution. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1990
Doyle, William, Origins of the French Revolution. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1999 (Third Edition)
Schama, Simon. Citizens: a Chronicle of the French Revolution. London: Viking, 1989
6. Last Bid for Universal Monarchy: Napoleon Bonaparte and his Empire (1799-1815)
The Consulate – The First French Empire – The Continental System – The Napoleonic Code
Required readings:
Ellis, Geoffrey James, The Napoleonic Empire. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Recommended readings:
Lyons, Martyn, Napoleon Bonaparte and the Legacy of the French Revolution, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Bell, David A., The First Total War: Napoleon's Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know It. London: Bloomsbury, 2008
Markham, Felix. Napoleon. New York: Penguin Books USA, 1963
7. “Long Live the King!”: The Restoration and the July Monarchy (1815-1848)
The Congress of Vienna – Talleyrand – Louis XVIII and Charles X – The Revolution of 1830 – Louis-Philippe
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.1-92
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.136-149
Price, Munro. The Perilous Crown: France Between Revolutions, 1814-1848. London: Pan, 2008. Pp.151-188
Recommended readings:
Mansel, Philip. Paris Between Empires: Monarchy and Revolution 1814-1852. London: Phoenix, 2003
8. The Springtime of the Peoples (1848)
The Revolution of 1848 – The June Days – The French Second Republic
Required readings:
Price, Munro. The Perilous Crown: France Between Revolutions, 1814-1848. London: Pan, 2008. Pp.326-378
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.93-107
9. Napoléon Le Petit: Napoleon III (1848-1870)
The 1851 Coup d’État – Baron Haussmann and the rebuilding of Paris – The Franco-Prussian War – A reappraisal of Napoleon III
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.108-144
Price, Roger, Napoleon III and the Second Empire. London: Routledge, 1997
Recommended readings:
Bresler, Fenton S. Napoleon III: A Life. London: HarperCollins, 1999
10. Third Time Lucky? The Establishment of the French Third Republic (1870-1905)
Legitimists and Orléanists – The 1875 Constitution – The 16 May 1877 crisis – The victory of the Republic – The separation of Church and State
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.145-180
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.159-173
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969. Pp.15-29, 57-75
Recommended readings:
Chapman, Guy. The Third Republic of France: The First Phase, 1871-1894. London: Macmillan, 1962
11. La Belle Époque (1871-1914)
Scientific progress and artistic prowess – The World’s Fairs in Paris – The Dreyfus Affair – The Panama Scandal – How beautiful the “Beautiful Era”?
Required readings:
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.289-306
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969. Pp.30-56
Recommended readings:
McAuliffe, Mary. Dawn of the Belle Époque: The Paris of Monet, Zola, Bernhardt, Eiffel, Debussy, Clemenceau, and Their Friends. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2011
12. Empire and Colonialism (1534-1939)
New France, the West Indies and the French East India Company – The triangular slave trade – The Wars of Succession and the Seven Years’ War – The Republic of Haiti – The conquest of Algeria – The Scramble for Africa – France’s “civilizing mission”
Required readings:
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.92-108, 173-180
Recommended readings:
Aldrich, Robert, Greater France: A History of French Overseas Expansion. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Macmillan, 1996
Betts, Raymond F., Assimilation and association in French colonial theory 1890-1914. New York: Columbia University Press, 1961
13. The War to End all Wars: World War I (1914-1918)
The road to war: the arms race, the Moroccan crises and the Triple Entente – The outbreak of war – The Western Front – The Home Front – The Treaty of Versailles – The memory of the war
Required readings:
Smith, Leonard V. (ed.). France and the Great War, 1914-1918. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003
Recommended readings:
Audoin-Rouzeau, Stéphane and Annette Becker, 14-18: Understanding the Great War. New York: Hill and Wang, 2003
14. The French Far-Right from its origins to the present day
General Boulanger – L’Action Française – The leagues and the 6 February 1934 crisis – The French Social Party – La Cagoule – Pétainism – Poujadism – The National Front
Required readings:
Davies, Peter. The Extreme Right in France, 1789 to the Present: from de Maistre to Le Pen. London: Routledge, 2002
Recommended readings:
Brunelle, Gayle K. and Annette Finley-Croswhite, Murder in the Metro: Laetitia Toureaux and the Cagoule in 1930s France. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2012
15. The French Far-Left from its origins to the present day
The Jacobins – Utopian Socialism – The Paris Commune – The Radicals – Anarchism and anarcho-syndicalism – The French Communist Party – Trotskyism – The Left Front
Recommended readings:
Andress, David. The Terror: The Merciless War for Freedom in Revolutionary France. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006
Horne, Alistair, The fall of Paris: the Siege and the Commune 1870-71. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981
16. The Decline and Fall of the Third Republic: Interwar France (1919-1939)
Les Années folles – The Great Depression – The Popular Front – The League of Nations – Franco-German relations
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.245-303
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.185-202
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.330-348
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.1-62
17. France’s Darkest Hour: World War II (1939-1945)
The Phoney War – The Fall of France – The German Occupation – Vichy – The Holocaust – Charles de Gaulle and the Free French Forces – Allied Liberation
Required readings:
Fenby, Jonathan. The General: Charles De Gaulle and the France he saved. London: Simon & Schuster, 2010. Pp.1-38
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.63-123
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969. Pp.1-14
Recommended readings:
Davies, Peter. France and the Second World War: Occupation, Collaboration and Resistance. London: Routledge, 2001
Jackson, Julian. France: The Dark Years, 1940-1944. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001
Paxton, Robert O. Vichy France, Old Guard and New Order. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001 (Revised Edition)
Vinen, Richard, The Unfree French: Life under the Occupation. London: Allen Lane, 2006
Williams, Charles. The Last Great Frenchman – A Life of General De Gaulle. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 1997
18. Same old story: The Fourth Republic (1946-1958)
The 1946 Constitution – Parliamentary crises – The rebuilding of France – The Cold War – The European Economic Community
Required readings:
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.377-396
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.137-175
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.340-360.
19. Decolonization and End of Empire (1946-1995)
The French Union and the French Community – The Indochina War – The Algerian War – The decolonization of Africa – Françafrique and Neo-colonialism
Required readings:
Clayton, Anthony, The Wars of French Decolonization. London; New York: Longman, 1994
Recommended readings:
Evans, Martin. Algeria: France's Undeclared War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012
Shipway, Martin. Decolonization and its Impact: A Comparative Approach to the End of the Colonial Empires. Malden; Oxford: Blackwell, 2008
20. The Fifth Republic under de Gaulle (1958-1969)
The May 1958 crisis – The new constitution – Les Trente Glorieuses – May 1968 – The 1969 French constitutional referendum
Required readings:
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.217-235
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.397-417
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.176-222, 280-308
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.315-339.
21. Le roman national: The French and their Past
French national mythology – Icons and taboos – The history taught in schools – History as a political tool – The French self-perception
Recommended readings:
Agulhon, Maurice. Marianne into Battle: Republican imagery and symbolism in France, 1789-1880. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981
Hazareesingh, Sudhir. The Legend of Napoleon. London: Granta, 2005
Ibid. In the Shadow of the General: Modern France and the Myth of De Gaulle. New York: Oxford University Press USA, 2012
22. How exceptional the “French exception”?
France’s place in world history – France’s legacy – The French ideal as a universal ideal – Perceptions of France abroad
Required readings:
Jack, Andrew, The French Exception: France - Still So Special? London: Profile Books, 1999. Pp.1-24, 252-280
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.264-283.
Recommended readings:
Chafer, Tony and Emmanuel Godin (eds.).The French exception. New York: Berghahn Books, 2005
Ibid. The End of the French Exception? Decline and Revival of the ‘French model’. Basingstoke; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010
Wesseling, H. L. (ed.). Certain Ideas of France: Essays on French History and Civilization. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2002
23. America’s “Old Friend and Ally”: A History of Franco-American Relations
France in the American Revolutionary War – The Quasi-War – The Louisiana Purchase – France in the American Civil War – America in the World Wars – The Marshall Plan – The Suez Crisis – French withdrawal from NATO – The Gulf War – The War in Iraq – French anti-Americanism and American anti-French sentiment
Recommended readings:
Blumenthal, Henry, France and the United States: Their Diplomatic Relations, 1789-1914. Chapel Hill, 1970
Cogan, Charles G., Oldest Allies, Guarded Friends: The United States and France since 1940. Westport: Praeger, 1994
24. “France has not […] finished astonishing the world” (Jacques Chirac, 2007): France in the 21st Century and beyond
Is France still a Great Power? – France in the new global order – France and the European Union – The future of the French language and of French cultural influence
Required readings:
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.284-309.
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989.
Clayton, Anthony, The Wars of French Decolonization. London; New York: Longman, 1994
Davies, Peter. France and the Second World War: Occupation, Collaboration and Resistance. London: Routledge, 2001
Ibid. The Extreme Right in France, 1789 to the Present: from de Maistre to Le Pen. London: Routledge, 2002
Doyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002 (Second Edition)
Ellis, Geoffrey James, The Napoleonic Empire. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Fenby, Jonathan. The General: Charles De Gaulle and the France he saved. London: Simon & Schuster, 2010
Furet, François, Revolutionary France, 1770-1880. Oxford; Cambridge, Mass: Blackwell Publishers, 1992
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005
Jack, Andrew, The French Exception: France - Still So Special? London: Profile Books, 1999
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997
Paxton, Robert O. Vichy France, Old Guard and New Order. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001 (Revised Edition)
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition)
Price, Roger, Napoleon III and the Second Empire. London: Routledge, 1997
Smith, Leonard V. (ed.). France and the Great War, 1914-1918. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003
Recommended readings:
Agulhon, Maurice. Marianne into Battle: Republican imagery and symbolism in France, 1789-1880. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981
Aldrich, Robert, Greater France: A History of French Overseas Expansion. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Macmillan, 1996
Andress, David. The Terror: The Merciless War for Freedom in Revolutionary France. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.
Audoin-Rouzeau, Stéphane and Annette Becker, 14-18: Understanding the Great War. New York: Hill and Wang, 2003
Bell, David A., The First Total War: Napoleon's Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know It. London : Bloomsbury, 2008
Betts, Raymond F., Assimilation and association in French colonial theory 1890-1914. New York: Columbia University Press, 1961
Blumenthal, Henry, France and the United States: Their Diplomatic Relations, 1789-1914. Chapel Hill, 1970
Bresler, Fenton S. Napoleon III: A Life. London: HarperCollins, 1999
Brunelle, Gayle K. and Annette Finley-Croswhite, Murder in the Metro: Laetitia Toureaux and the Cagoule in 1930s France. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2012
Chafer, Tony and Emmanuel Godin (eds.).The French exception. New York: Berghahn Books, 2005
Ibid. The End of the French Exception? Decline and Revival of the ‘French model’. Basingstoke; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010
Chapman, Guy. The Third Republic of France: The First Phase, 1871-1894. London: Macmillan, 1962
Chartier, Roger. The Cultural Origins of the French Revolution. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1990
Church, William F., The Greatness of Louis XIV. Myth or Reality? Boston: D.C. Heath and Company (1959)
Cogan, Charles G., Oldest Allies, Guarded Friends: The United States and France since 1940. Westport: Praeger, 1994
Doyle, William, Origins of the French Revolution. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1999 (Third Edition)
Dunlop, Ian, Louis XIV. London: Chatto & Windus, 1999
Evans, Martin. Algeria: France's undeclared war. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012
Goodman, Dena. The Republic of Letters: Cultural History of the French Enlightenment. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition)
Hazareesingh, Sudhir. The Legend of Napoleon. London: Granta, 2005
Ibid. In the Shadow of the General: Modern France and the Myth of De Gaulle. New York: Oxford University Press USA, 2012
Horne, Alistair, The fall of Paris: the Siege and the Commune 1870-71. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981
Jackson, Julian. France: The Dark Years, 1940-1944. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001
Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. Ancien Regime: History of France, 1610-1774. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 1998
Lyons, Martyn, Napoleon Bonaparte and the Legacy of the French Revolution, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Mansel, Philip. Paris Between Empires: Monarchy and Revolution 1814-1852. London: Phoenix, 2003
Markham, Felix. Napoleon. New York: Penguin Books USA, 1963
McAuliffe, Mary. Dawn of the Belle Époque: The Paris of Monet, Zola, Bernhardt, Eiffel, Debussy, Clemenceau, and Their Friends. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2011
Price, Munro. The Perilous Crown: France Between Revolutions, 1814-1848. London: Pan, 2008
Schama, Simon. Citizens: a Chronicle of the French Revolution. London: Viking, 1989
Shipway, Martin. Decolonization and its Impact: A Comparative Approach to the End of the Colonial Empires. Malden; Oxford: Blackwell, 2008
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969
Vinen, Richard, The Unfree French: Life under the Occupation. London: Allen Lane, 2006
Williams, Charles. The Last Great Frenchman – A Life of General De Gaulle. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 1997
Wesseling, H. L. (ed.). Certain Ideas of France: Essays on French History and Civilization. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2002
Brief Biography of Instructor:
Christopher Brennan is British but was brought up in France. He earned a Masters from the University of Oxford and a Ph.D. in International History from the London School of Economics. He has been holding seminars in European History at the latter since 2010, and won a teaching prize in 2012. His areas of interest are the Habsburg Monarchy, Germany and France in the 19th and 20th centuries.
History of Modern France: From the Renaissance to De Gaulle
This course aims to give students a solid grounding in Modern French History, and a detailed understanding of the chronology, events, trends and themes running from the Renaissance to the fall of General de Gaulle. Though primarily a political, diplomatic and military history of France in the 19th and 20th centuries, the course will not neglect the cultural, intellectual and socio-economic developments of the period. It will also seek to investigate the specificity – if any – of French history and to determine its significance within European and world history.
Previous study of history – particularly European – helpful but not essential
By the end of the course students will be able to:
• Place, comprehend and contextualize the key events in Modern French History
• Identify thematic threads running through the course
• Display familiarity with the historiography of the subject
• Apply independent thought and critical analysis to the topics covered
• Understand the nature of historical study
Lecture (30-45 mins) and discussion (1h–45 mins) based on the lecture, preparatory reading, documents or case studies. One field trip is included.
Class participation (20%); written assignment (20%); written mid-term exam (20%); written final exam (40%)
Written assignment: 2,500-word essay from a selection of 30-40 titles based on the class topics. Examples of possible topics include "Why did the Vichy Regime fail to attract grassroots support?"; "Explain the significance of Alsace-Lorraine in French historical mythology”; "On his deathbed, Louis XIV confessed that he had 'loved war too much' - what were the consequences for France?"; "How do you interpret De Gaulle's famous 'Je vous ai compris' during his June 1958 speech in Algiers?"
Session 1: Introduction: The Making of Modern France (35,000 BC-15th Century AD)
Prehistory – The Gauls – The Roman invasion – Christianity – The Franks – Charlemagne – The Middle Ages – The Hundred Years’ War
Required readings:
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.1-19
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.3-14
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.6-45
2. The Renaissance and the Wars of Religion (15th-17th Centuries)
Art and science of the Renaissance – Francis I – The establishment of the French language – The Protestant Reformation – Henry IV – Richelieu – The Thirty Years’ War
Required readings:
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.86-141
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.46-64
3. The Sun King: Louis XIV (1661-1715)
The French attempt at European domination – The revocation of the Edict of Nantes – Louis as a patron of the arts – The court at Versailles
Required readings:
Dunlop, Ian, Louis XIV. London: Chatto & Windus, 1999. Pp.198-217, 265-283
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.142-172
Recommended readings:
Church, William F., The Greatness of Louis XIV. Myth or Reality? Boston: D.C. Heath and Company (1959)
4. Les Lumières: The French Enlightenment (18th Century)
The social, economic and political structures of the Ancien Régime – The reign of Louis XV – The Philosophes (Voltaire, Rousseau, Montesquieu, Diderot, D’Holbach etc.) – The impact of the French Enlightenment at home and abroad
Required readings:
Doyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002 (Second Edition). Pp.44-65
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.173-184
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.77-95
Recommended readings:
Goodman, Dena. The Republic of Letters: Cultural History of the French Enlightenment. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996
Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. Ancien Regime: History of France, 1610-1774. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 1998
5. “Oh! It’ll be fine”: The French Revolution (1789-1799)
The storming of the Bastille – Constitutional monarchy – Terror – The War in the Vendée – The Directory – The French Revolutionary Wars
Required readings:
Doyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002 (Second Edition). Pp.391-425
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.97-150
Recommended readings:
Chartier, Roger. The Cultural Origins of the French Revolution. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1990
Doyle, William, Origins of the French Revolution. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1999 (Third Edition)
Schama, Simon. Citizens: a Chronicle of the French Revolution. London: Viking, 1989
6. Last Bid for Universal Monarchy: Napoleon Bonaparte and his Empire (1799-1815)
The Consulate – The First French Empire – The Continental System – The Napoleonic Code
Required readings:
Ellis, Geoffrey James, The Napoleonic Empire. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Recommended readings:
Lyons, Martyn, Napoleon Bonaparte and the Legacy of the French Revolution, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Bell, David A., The First Total War: Napoleon's Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know It. London: Bloomsbury, 2008
Markham, Felix. Napoleon. New York: Penguin Books USA, 1963
7. “Long Live the King!”: The Restoration and the July Monarchy (1815-1848)
The Congress of Vienna – Talleyrand – Louis XVIII and Charles X – The Revolution of 1830 – Louis-Philippe
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.1-92
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.136-149
Price, Munro. The Perilous Crown: France Between Revolutions, 1814-1848. London: Pan, 2008. Pp.151-188
Recommended readings:
Mansel, Philip. Paris Between Empires: Monarchy and Revolution 1814-1852. London: Phoenix, 2003
8. The Springtime of the Peoples (1848)
The Revolution of 1848 – The June Days – The French Second Republic
Required readings:
Price, Munro. The Perilous Crown: France Between Revolutions, 1814-1848. London: Pan, 2008. Pp.326-378
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.93-107
9. Napoléon Le Petit: Napoleon III (1848-1870)
The 1851 Coup d’État – Baron Haussmann and the rebuilding of Paris – The Franco-Prussian War – A reappraisal of Napoleon III
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.108-144
Price, Roger, Napoleon III and the Second Empire. London: Routledge, 1997
Recommended readings:
Bresler, Fenton S. Napoleon III: A Life. London: HarperCollins, 1999
10. Third Time Lucky? The Establishment of the French Third Republic (1870-1905)
Legitimists and Orléanists – The 1875 Constitution – The 16 May 1877 crisis – The victory of the Republic – The separation of Church and State
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.145-180
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.159-173
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969. Pp.15-29, 57-75
Recommended readings:
Chapman, Guy. The Third Republic of France: The First Phase, 1871-1894. London: Macmillan, 1962
11. La Belle Époque (1871-1914)
Scientific progress and artistic prowess – The World’s Fairs in Paris – The Dreyfus Affair – The Panama Scandal – How beautiful the “Beautiful Era”?
Required readings:
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.289-306
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969. Pp.30-56
Recommended readings:
McAuliffe, Mary. Dawn of the Belle Époque: The Paris of Monet, Zola, Bernhardt, Eiffel, Debussy, Clemenceau, and Their Friends. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2011
12. Empire and Colonialism (1534-1939)
New France, the West Indies and the French East India Company – The triangular slave trade – The Wars of Succession and the Seven Years’ War – The Republic of Haiti – The conquest of Algeria – The Scramble for Africa – France’s “civilizing mission”
Required readings:
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.92-108, 173-180
Recommended readings:
Aldrich, Robert, Greater France: A History of French Overseas Expansion. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Macmillan, 1996
Betts, Raymond F., Assimilation and association in French colonial theory 1890-1914. New York: Columbia University Press, 1961
13. The War to End all Wars: World War I (1914-1918)
The road to war: the arms race, the Moroccan crises and the Triple Entente – The outbreak of war – The Western Front – The Home Front – The Treaty of Versailles – The memory of the war
Required readings:
Smith, Leonard V. (ed.). France and the Great War, 1914-1918. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003
Recommended readings:
Audoin-Rouzeau, Stéphane and Annette Becker, 14-18: Understanding the Great War. New York: Hill and Wang, 2003
14. The French Far-Right from its origins to the present day
General Boulanger – L’Action Française – The leagues and the 6 February 1934 crisis – The French Social Party – La Cagoule – Pétainism – Poujadism – The National Front
Required readings:
Davies, Peter. The Extreme Right in France, 1789 to the Present: from de Maistre to Le Pen. London: Routledge, 2002
Recommended readings:
Brunelle, Gayle K. and Annette Finley-Croswhite, Murder in the Metro: Laetitia Toureaux and the Cagoule in 1930s France. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2012
15. The French Far-Left from its origins to the present day
The Jacobins – Utopian Socialism – The Paris Commune – The Radicals – Anarchism and anarcho-syndicalism – The French Communist Party – Trotskyism – The Left Front
Recommended readings:
Andress, David. The Terror: The Merciless War for Freedom in Revolutionary France. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006
Horne, Alistair, The fall of Paris: the Siege and the Commune 1870-71. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981
16. The Decline and Fall of the Third Republic: Interwar France (1919-1939)
Les Années folles – The Great Depression – The Popular Front – The League of Nations – Franco-German relations
Required readings:
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989. Pp.245-303
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.185-202
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.330-348
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.1-62
17. France’s Darkest Hour: World War II (1939-1945)
The Phoney War – The Fall of France – The German Occupation – Vichy – The Holocaust – Charles de Gaulle and the Free French Forces – Allied Liberation
Required readings:
Fenby, Jonathan. The General: Charles De Gaulle and the France he saved. London: Simon & Schuster, 2010. Pp.1-38
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.63-123
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969. Pp.1-14
Recommended readings:
Davies, Peter. France and the Second World War: Occupation, Collaboration and Resistance. London: Routledge, 2001
Jackson, Julian. France: The Dark Years, 1940-1944. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001
Paxton, Robert O. Vichy France, Old Guard and New Order. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001 (Revised Edition)
Vinen, Richard, The Unfree French: Life under the Occupation. London: Allen Lane, 2006
Williams, Charles. The Last Great Frenchman – A Life of General De Gaulle. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 1997
18. Same old story: The Fourth Republic (1946-1958)
The 1946 Constitution – Parliamentary crises – The rebuilding of France – The Cold War – The European Economic Community
Required readings:
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.377-396
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.137-175
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.340-360.
19. Decolonization and End of Empire (1946-1995)
The French Union and the French Community – The Indochina War – The Algerian War – The decolonization of Africa – Françafrique and Neo-colonialism
Required readings:
Clayton, Anthony, The Wars of French Decolonization. London; New York: Longman, 1994
Recommended readings:
Evans, Martin. Algeria: France's Undeclared War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012
Shipway, Martin. Decolonization and its Impact: A Comparative Approach to the End of the Colonial Empires. Malden; Oxford: Blackwell, 2008
20. The Fifth Republic under de Gaulle (1958-1969)
The May 1958 crisis – The new constitution – Les Trente Glorieuses – May 1968 – The 1969 French constitutional referendum
Required readings:
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition). Pp.217-235
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Pp.397-417
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. Pp.176-222, 280-308
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition). Pp.315-339.
21. Le roman national: The French and their Past
French national mythology – Icons and taboos – The history taught in schools – History as a political tool – The French self-perception
Recommended readings:
Agulhon, Maurice. Marianne into Battle: Republican imagery and symbolism in France, 1789-1880. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981
Hazareesingh, Sudhir. The Legend of Napoleon. London: Granta, 2005
Ibid. In the Shadow of the General: Modern France and the Myth of De Gaulle. New York: Oxford University Press USA, 2012
22. How exceptional the “French exception”?
France’s place in world history – France’s legacy – The French ideal as a universal ideal – Perceptions of France abroad
Required readings:
Jack, Andrew, The French Exception: France - Still So Special? London: Profile Books, 1999. Pp.1-24, 252-280
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.264-283.
Recommended readings:
Chafer, Tony and Emmanuel Godin (eds.).The French exception. New York: Berghahn Books, 2005
Ibid. The End of the French Exception? Decline and Revival of the ‘French model’. Basingstoke; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010
Wesseling, H. L. (ed.). Certain Ideas of France: Essays on French History and Civilization. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2002
23. America’s “Old Friend and Ally”: A History of Franco-American Relations
France in the American Revolutionary War – The Quasi-War – The Louisiana Purchase – France in the American Civil War – America in the World Wars – The Marshall Plan – The Suez Crisis – French withdrawal from NATO – The Gulf War – The War in Iraq – French anti-Americanism and American anti-French sentiment
Recommended readings:
Blumenthal, Henry, France and the United States: Their Diplomatic Relations, 1789-1914. Chapel Hill, 1970
Cogan, Charles G., Oldest Allies, Guarded Friends: The United States and France since 1940. Westport: Praeger, 1994
24. “France has not […] finished astonishing the world” (Jacques Chirac, 2007): France in the 21st Century and beyond
Is France still a Great Power? – France in the new global order – France and the European Union – The future of the French language and of French cultural influence
Required readings:
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011. Pp.284-309.
Brogan, D. W. The French Nation, From Napoleon to Pétain: 1815–1940. London: Cassell, 1989.
Clayton, Anthony, The Wars of French Decolonization. London; New York: Longman, 1994
Davies, Peter. France and the Second World War: Occupation, Collaboration and Resistance. London: Routledge, 2001
Ibid. The Extreme Right in France, 1789 to the Present: from de Maistre to Le Pen. London: Routledge, 2002
Doyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002 (Second Edition)
Ellis, Geoffrey James, The Napoleonic Empire. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Fenby, Jonathan. The General: Charles De Gaulle and the France he saved. London: Simon & Schuster, 2010
Furet, François, Revolutionary France, 1770-1880. Oxford; Cambridge, Mass: Blackwell Publishers, 1992
Horne, Alistair. La Belle France: A Short History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005
Jack, Andrew, The French Exception: France - Still So Special? London: Profile Books, 1999
Jenkins, Cecil. A Brief History of France. London: Constable & Robinson, 2011
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People, 1936-1996. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997
Paxton, Robert O. Vichy France, Old Guard and New Order. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001 (Revised Edition)
Price, Roger. A Concise History of France. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008 (Second Edition)
Price, Roger, Napoleon III and the Second Empire. London: Routledge, 1997
Smith, Leonard V. (ed.). France and the Great War, 1914-1918. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003
Agulhon, Maurice. Marianne into Battle: Republican imagery and symbolism in France, 1789-1880. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981
Aldrich, Robert, Greater France: A History of French Overseas Expansion. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Macmillan, 1996
Andress, David. The Terror: The Merciless War for Freedom in Revolutionary France. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.
Audoin-Rouzeau, Stéphane and Annette Becker, 14-18: Understanding the Great War. New York: Hill and Wang, 2003
Bell, David A., The First Total War: Napoleon's Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know It. London : Bloomsbury, 2008
Betts, Raymond F., Assimilation and association in French colonial theory 1890-1914. New York: Columbia University Press, 1961
Blumenthal, Henry, France and the United States: Their Diplomatic Relations, 1789-1914. Chapel Hill, 1970
Bresler, Fenton S. Napoleon III: A Life. London: HarperCollins, 1999
Brunelle, Gayle K. and Annette Finley-Croswhite, Murder in the Metro: Laetitia Toureaux and the Cagoule in 1930s France. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2012
Chafer, Tony and Emmanuel Godin (eds.).The French exception. New York: Berghahn Books, 2005
Ibid. The End of the French Exception? Decline and Revival of the ‘French model’. Basingstoke; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010
Chapman, Guy. The Third Republic of France: The First Phase, 1871-1894. London: Macmillan, 1962
Chartier, Roger. The Cultural Origins of the French Revolution. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1990
Church, William F., The Greatness of Louis XIV. Myth or Reality? Boston: D.C. Heath and Company (1959)
Cogan, Charles G., Oldest Allies, Guarded Friends: The United States and France since 1940. Westport: Praeger, 1994
Doyle, William, Origins of the French Revolution. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1999 (Third Edition)
Dunlop, Ian, Louis XIV. London: Chatto & Windus, 1999
Evans, Martin. Algeria: France's undeclared war. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012
Goodman, Dena. The Republic of Letters: Cultural History of the French Enlightenment. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996
Hampden Jackson, J. (ed.), A Short History of France from Early Times to 1972. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980 (Second Edition)
Hazareesingh, Sudhir. The Legend of Napoleon. London: Granta, 2005
Ibid. In the Shadow of the General: Modern France and the Myth of De Gaulle. New York: Oxford University Press USA, 2012
Horne, Alistair, The fall of Paris: the Siege and the Commune 1870-71. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981
Jackson, Julian. France: The Dark Years, 1940-1944. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001
Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. Ancien Regime: History of France, 1610-1774. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 1998
Lyons, Martyn, Napoleon Bonaparte and the Legacy of the French Revolution, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 (Second Edition)
Mansel, Philip. Paris Between Empires: Monarchy and Revolution 1814-1852. London: Phoenix, 2003
Markham, Felix. Napoleon. New York: Penguin Books USA, 1963
McAuliffe, Mary. Dawn of the Belle Époque: The Paris of Monet, Zola, Bernhardt, Eiffel, Debussy, Clemenceau, and Their Friends. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2011
Price, Munro. The Perilous Crown: France Between Revolutions, 1814-1848. London: Pan, 2008
Schama, Simon. Citizens: a Chronicle of the French Revolution. London: Viking, 1989
Shipway, Martin. Decolonization and its Impact: A Comparative Approach to the End of the Colonial Empires. Malden; Oxford: Blackwell, 2008
Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969
Vinen, Richard, The Unfree French: Life under the Occupation. London: Allen Lane, 2006
Williams, Charles. The Last Great Frenchman – A Life of General De Gaulle. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 1997
Wesseling, H. L. (ed.). Certain Ideas of France: Essays on French History and Civilization. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2002
Christopher Brennan is British but was brought up in France. He earned a Masters from the University of Oxford and a Ph.D. in International History from the London School of Economics. He has been holding seminars in European History at the latter since 2010, and won a teaching prize in 2012. His areas of interest are the Habsburg Monarchy, Germany and France in the 19th and 20th centuries.