To the evenings event with robert ross bottom presenting his new book sudden courage we are pleased to have cspan book tv today here abplease know you will be recorded and please wait a moment for the microphone to come to you before asking a question. We have a great lineup over the next couple of months which includes National BookAward Finalist alan lightman, Pulitzer Prize winner Samantha Power and New York Times bestselling novelist alice hoffman. For more details and information on these and many Upcoming Events please visit the Events Calendar harvard. Com events and sign up for weekly email newsletter. After tonights q a will have a book signing at this table. The client will form toward the left and book around the corner because theres a lot of you. We have a couple copies of his previous book for sale to register and a lot of copies of his new book which she will have to fight for the register as well. I like to take a moment to say thanks for buying books here at the harvard bookstore. You purchase of the series and ensure the future of independent bookstore, thank you. Finally, a quick reminder to silence your cell phones before the talk. Now im very pleased to introduce tonight speaker, ronald roz bob, professor in arts and humanities and professor of french, european and architectural studies in Amherst College. His previous book, when paris went dark, the city of light under German Occupation 1940 to 1944 was long listed for the National Book award for fiction. His published many articles and reviews edited three essay collections and written two monographs. He was bestowed with the french order of Academic Merit and im going to butcher this but i let him pronounce it, if you dont mind. a thank you. Which is just basically to say hes a knight and im suddenly reconsidering a career in academics. Tonight hes here to present sudden courage, youth and france confront the german, 1940 to 1945, which was praised by Publishers Weekly as captivating and Pulitzer Prizewinning author William Taubman calls it marvelous. Remarking that one can only hope that sudden courage will not be needed again. We are so pleased to have him here with us tonight, please join me in welcoming ronald ro Ronald Rosbottom you can hear me . Its so nice to be here this evening. This is one of my favorite bookstores. Im flattered to have been invited to talk to you about my new book here. The day is a publication date so this is really an important day. You can now get this on amazon. [laughter] and bookstores. Im glad to see so many prints here. So many of my former students are here, many of whom i gave see abc s two. My son is here a [laughter] this book came to me when i was writing this book which was published five years ago this month, which is when paris went dark. It deals with what it was like to live in paris. I often wonder i go to paris, i teach a course in the history of paris and started asking myself, what was like to live in paris during the occupation . Paris was never bombed by the germans but it was certainly occupied by the germans. As i wrote, i kept running into and finding evidence of young people who had participated in some sort of resistance against the germans or against the socalled vichy government which was the right wing quasifascist government that was established after an arm assist. So i said, it would be interesting to know more about this. More about who they were, why they resisted, not all young people resisted. Many just kept their heads low. And hope that things would work themselves out. Others joined and participated in the support of the vichy government. But i was interested in the ones who really put their lives on the line. So i read a lot of memoirs, a lot of diaries, a lot of letters. I interviewed very few people, for my first book i interviewed a lot of people. Its very easy to go up and asked someone what was life like when you were a young person. But its not easy to go up and ask, to find someone still alive in the resistant and then asked them to talk about it. I was fortunate to find a couple who really really were very helpful. Sudden courage the title came from the idea that france had been defeated suddenly. Six weeks most powerful army in europe, including german army and the british army was the french army in terms of our men come in terms of aircraft, in terms of men under arms. And hitler was expecting, he had made it them but he expecting more to last about a year. It lasted six weeks. Within six weeks the french were pushed back all the way to dunkirk. You know that story. This stunned the french. At all levels. No matter whom whether they were cognitive, abcommunists, jews, gentiles, rightwing, monarchist, everyone was stunned by the suddenness of it. Soon after that, there was a resistance to the president s of the germans and soon and or to the Bc Government, which was run by the french but really they were handmaidens to the germans. I found some stories. My book is essentially stories of maybe a little less than a dozen of these people. Men and women, what surprised me was their youth. I emphasized roughly i used 15 to 25 roughly as my idea of adolescence and youth which some were as young as 13. They were quick to resist at least if not physically at least ideologically. And thats what the book is about. I dont have a lot of answers as to why because there are all kinds of reasons the young person does this. I talk about that. The more i wrote, than what im going to do now is read you a few passages i want to leave enough time for questions, which is always the most interesting part of these readings. As i was writing i kept reading about as you are now about all the young people going around the streets around the world. In hong kong right now i dont know whats going to happen but its not going to be nice what happens in hong kong but those millions of people were led originally by young people, still very much involved. Istanbul, algiers, we dont read a lot about algiers but its remarkable what young people have done intimidating. Really authoritarian government. And then all kids. The parkland massacre the most recent. What is it that motivates young people to go to the streets and then what is it that keeps all the people from doing the same thing . Let me begin by reading you a few of these stories and then i will read a brief conclusion in my book and then we can open it up. One of the most interesting characters, these are all true stories, this is not a novel. This is a work of history. These are all people who really existed. One of the most interesting, i devoted a whole chapter, a young man who from the age of seven was blind, totally blind. He was horsing around with some friends in school and he was tripped and he fell and he hit his head on the corner of the desk and it popped out one of his eyes. Within two days his second i, sympathetically they say, became line. From the age of seven he was totally blind. The age of 17 by the age of 17 his name was jock lucille and by the age of 18 he was leading the Largest Group of young resisters in paris. Hundreds of kids whom he helped recruit who were not taking up arms but were passing out undergrad newspapers, which was dangerous. You could get arrested and be put in jail for doing that. And if you are unlucky enough you could get executed if you happen to be in jail at the wrong time and the germans wanted to make a statement. Let me tell you about lucille. The tight group decided to meet somewhere so his friends together and said we have to do something. He was a gentile, he was they were moderately sort of in the center politically. They were essentially gaullist. No one had heard of Charles De Gaulle when he made his famous speech. Slightly older military cathol catholic, simply conservative. But not as conservative as those who were running or who didnt believe of course, or who believed in the idea of public. So when he and a few friends got together about 16 years old, then they decide to have to do something you dont know exactly what to do. So this tight group decided to be somewhere besides her parents apartments, they found as others would over the next three years, and dilapidated building. This particular one on the southern borders of paris, transient students orders and was watched by a complacent concierge. The comings and goings of itinerant tenants Service Cover for the occasional presence of a bunch of teenagers. Next, they became precise in recruitment. Inviting just anyone to join was a sure path to exposure. Already word of the presence of this you group had gotten around to casually. So the original team started over. This time, different system of interviewing that would have no equal during the resistance. Interested adolescents even those who if it the very first meetings, had to go see the blind guy. Thats what they said. Go see the blind guy. His coconspirator agreed that jock would be the only recruiter the one person who would say yes or no to up person. This was a completely countering intuitive vote of confidence in the blind friend. Did not one need to see in order to recognize danger to be able to look directly at those so eager to become warriors for liberty . But at the time, the choice was quick. And unanimous. No other peer was as trusted and respected as shock. Jock. His usefulness was intellectual and perceptive and no one criticized him for his inability to act physically. The rules of recruitment of young assistance was quickly established. Heres how it works. Jock whose name was unknown to most of the later candidates, when is recoded knock at his apartment store. When he would welcome the young man still no women, ask his name, and laid him down a somber hallway into his darkened room. Certainly furnished we put two facing chairs in its center. Naturally, jacks blindness was discomfiting for the candidate. Lucy hall would ask an interviewee to take those seat facing him and then would begin in a noxious conversation about anything except the purpose of the interview. School, sports, the weather, interviewees families, there would be no direct question such as how you feel about the government or are your parents coming at us. The stranger would be anxious to talk about joining the Resistance Group whose assured his interviewer of his commitment and dedication. But when he would wait until when he got a sense of tone of voice and movements and commanded the moment. How did the visitor phrase his sinuses, was enormous, could be made to relax, did when he shake his leg, rub his hands on his trousers, was it the odor of sweat. None of these indicators immediately killed in applicant his chances that his ability to relax and speak we put unpretentious confidence, and to explain his own moral values would weigh heavily upon the decision. After this initial questioning, jock would propose if you listen less subtle questions about how the occupation to be affecting his candidate. How his family might respond to his becoming a member of a clandestine group. You might ask about interviewees friends. Or his favorite professors for the books when he read. Eventually jock would end the interview. The young recruit would be led again through the long haul to the door, where as it slowly closed, when he would be thanked for having come and admonish about letting anyone know of this meeting. The young would be, would have hope for of acceptance but no commitment had been made and no future meetings set. Young boys ages 17 to 19, and then older ones mostly University Students begin to show up and meet jock. When he writes, they were scholars from the colleges and letters and science and pharmacy in law. Chemistry physics, the movement was growing at the pace of a living cell. After each interview, jock we discussed the potential recruit we put his close advisors. What when he had gleaned from the interview was not solely biographical or fissile philosophical or political information, but what we would call moral information. When he was brilliantly stewed. The signs of person gives when they are trying to hide secrets how to impress or to shade the truth. Even july. They tells us that when he interviewed about 600 youngsters. During his two years as leader of the group. This is almost inconceivable number. But as is entirely credible. This was his major responsibility and when he was brilliant at it. His ability to remember even the smallest detail was phenomenal. When he carried hundreds of names and phone numbers and addresses in his head. Another advantage for those now exists we put secrecy. His honesty, his integrity, his intelligence, reassured the nervous youngsters to be led and we need said no, no is stood. Jack would make only one mistake in his hundreds of interviews, but it would be a deadly one. Which you can read about if you buy the book. [laughter] i also, like the book does not mean you have to write it. You understand that. [laughter] if you know interested in those kids who are slightly younger, if you agers, 12 and 13. How did they respond to the sudden appearance of germans in their towns and then there cities. How they respond. They is it too were frustrated and angry that they heard their parents talk about the germans and about hitler. But they get they were is it too young really to control their parents and teachers, is it too young really to take on the more adult job for the more mature job of confronting the germans. I write about these kids. One of them is the man named, when he wrote a wonderful memoir, and when he was about 12 years old when the germans or i should say 1940, when he lived in paris. Let me tell you a little bit about him. It was that third christmas of the occupation, and there was no longer any avoiding the fact food even for celebrations was increasingly scarce and dearly expensive on the black market. That his mother had managed to scrounge up one piece of meat for the whole family and cooked a block we put vegetables that almost reminded him of past christmases. As soon as when he was finished, when he ran answers to share his holiday news we put his best friend. On the for separating their apartments, the door suddenly opened. And the excited boy bumped into a large german in uniform who is carrying trash. Mostly empty champagne bottles. When he was drunk. And his raiment tried to move around him, when he felt his shoulder wrapped and brushed boy said Merry Christmas boy. The boy froze and then when he allowed himself to be led into the department. There are several germans apparently officers, were sitting around the dinner table we put several german women most likely women who company the germans as occupying germans as secretaries nurses and assistance and so forth. Theyve been drinking for hours and kept speaking in german to the young boy. From apparently they had taken a sentimental liking to. When he cannot take his eyes off of the table. It was laid we put half eaten vegetables and lots of foods, they were not, the humble ones that the average princes could easily find. There were similar designers and if it was bright in color. Even for that time of year. Half eaten stakes in turkey mesmerized him. When he could feel his mouthwatering. Finally one of the women picked up a piece of white cake and offered it to the visibly hungry boy. Take she said its christmas. And when he sure said no. They all left for they could see when he was dying to take those bite. His eyes and lips be trying his lip self control. She pushed the dessert closer. So when he could smell it. But not quite tasty. When he still said no. Why. Years later, when he wrote that when he did not know why. Was it because when he knew his family was upstairs and they would have nothing. While when he indulged himself or was it because when he felt it was his patriotic duty to resist german punishments. Still, doesnt know. Finally they tired of this new man shut them out of the apartment. As puzzled as when he, as to why when he had refused what when he wanted more than anything at that moment. Good food. Im thinking for over 1213 yearold boys and girls. And they like any teenagers, they were on fish and could easily make fun of the germans not knowing again how dangerous that would be. They could bring potentially perilous moments of engagement. Running like animals down a crowded street, totally oblivious to who or what was in the way, when he and his friends saw one of the bodies suddenly trip beside a cafe. Try to catch himself, when he grabs a table, which overturns in coffee spilled onto the tablecloth and onto a german officer. The officer his foot had been is it too far and the sidewalk did not apologize rather when he jumped up and cursed and grabbed the boy and slapped him a couple of times. Another friend, immediately slapped the officer. Annabelle began among the three of four young teenage boys and the uniform members. The boys were in serious danger. As those around them new. They could be thrown into prison and perhaps running out as prostitutes to be shot to their be a terrorist attack in the next few weeks. Suddenly, two french policeman arrived and respectfully asked the officers what caused the fight. When told, they assured the occupiers that they resolve this matter immediately and took the boys off to the nearest police station. There the officer charged immediately line them up. Rather than throwing them in the cells when he said do you know how stupid you know to attack german officers in full daylight. Are you ready to go to prison. You put me in a real situation here. And they looked and aside from a few but they didnt say anything. The officer obviously one of these parisian policeman who were appalled, and how youngsters were being treated by the germans and asked a very cunning question. Okay, you slapped a german officer because when he had slept your friend. Would you have done the same thing if when he been a french businessman. Whod insulted your buddy. Thankfully, when he was smart and when he saw his way out. Of course, i was only responding emotionally to what i thought was an injustice. Stuart got a call your parents and put you in the cells and telecommuting you and learn of your shenanigans. This happened many times. During the occupations. Young people who didnt really realize what was behind the kind of ideology and evil that was behind those who are in german uniforms and by the way, i should add that many of the occupiers were not nazis, they were germans. German officers and young peop people, some of them this is the kids they were arresting. But they were supported by and they were behind one of the most cruel organizations in ever and you wrote which was the gestapo, dss and hitlers idea that in order to occupied country, youve got to deprive that country of any sense of comfort. One story about the sky. One of the friends was a young girl named jackie. In 1942, the german said only the stupidest thing the dead in france, they didnt think so but it turns out to benzo. It passed an ordinance, that every jewish person, french or immigrant, must wear a yellow scarf. From the age of six we do see these pictures the sales cards, yellow star is the single star that the parents were the children work. These six and seven and eight yearold kids up we put this big yellow star on. That really went far in changing the french citizens the gentiles attitudes toward the occupation. When the lsr ordinance was implemented mid 1942, catholic families good insulted their priests, and had discussions about this new order. Should they continue to invite jewish friends, their neighbors to their apartment the kids birthday parties and by the way there were many stories that they didnt even know their friends were jewish. They didnt even know the neighbors were jewish. They didnt know anything until they suddenly see this yellow star and 70. So the author way to befriend you. The jews. Those who remember, still lingering pain ive talked to some of them, during the star for the first time to school cause them to recognize apprehension even fear on the part of their gentile classmates. They did not respond to it. But often to the stars were provoked small but acts of courage by gentile children and adults. They reach out to hold hands still play games we put jewish children walk home we put her newly marked friends. His friends were gentiles, the effects of the yellow star ordinance became portably intimate we put her close friend jackie, an attractive teenager who would win the hearts of boys in the group, turned up one afternoon we put a yellow star on her dress. Why are you wearing that they cried. Because im a jew. She calmly answered. Theyd never know. They never talked about the religious beliefs. They were more interested in what parties are being held and who was flirting we put him. Besides jackies family was deeply assimilated i didnt practice a religion except for rare holidays. Still when he thought, she was a buddy, she would be all right. The silly star after all. Friday july the 17th 1942, the terror of what was happening around them finally hit the small clan. They noticed the groups of the neighbors were gathering around concierge host and muttering. On his return home, one of his friends on the news, they taken jackie who had the french cops, but white. His exaggerated friend asked. Havent you been paying attention. They are running up jews and taking them off to camp. To camp then setting up some are far away. The jews and communists, they are eliminating them. Shes only cad, they are taking mothers and babies is it too. And the old folks. Everyone. The french heard that a group of round up jews had been housed in a gymnasium where trucks would arrived to take them elsewhere. They ran into the site, clambered up to the third floor of the building across the street and peered out at the drama below. Send the trucks turn into street and join arms and began owning women only on the babies, old men, girls and boys. There was an eerie. [silence] as the prisoners stepped up into the vehicles. And we put rights, there suddenly there she was. I recognized her brown head of hair. Yes it was jackie walking slowly beside her mother. Her handicap father limped behind her we put her backpack on his shoulder. My buddy star. As we press our faces against the dirty window. When he tried desperately to open it. But it was just a check. When he then started to run down the stairs grabbed him, stay here. You only get into trouble. There isnt enough of us to fight the cops. When he seven steps and sobbed. My eyes had not left jackie. I saw her lifted into the truck by two cops and step inside. The last time, i glimpsed the white oval of her face and amasa brown hair that rolled down her shoulders and then nothing. It change the boys previously cavalier attitude for the occupier. The sudden awareness of the danger our friends were and showed to what. Are youthful consciences had been awakened. In spite of the massive dose of trying a light to lasers that official propaganda, was daily poring over us. Last, i want to read the last paragraphs of my book to show as i was writing this book, i became more and more aware of what was going around the world. And it couldnt, it was very hard to, not the same but the same demographic again, not every young person of their arminian people who will scrap the bomb to their chest and blow up other kids. There are many young people as weve seen recently will pick up a gun and kill people in a walmart or at school. Im talking about those though who see beyond this kind of anger. Kind of crippling anger. And reinforce their own sense of decency and that is so, let me conclude we put two short paragraphs. Todays newspapers and social media and tv are full of stories of the passionately stubborn of abuse around the world as they confront a frightening future. Climate change, governments, gun violence in the united states, stark racism and even the most tolerant nations, sexual and gender, and equality of women, now again the shadow of nuclear destruction. This is energized all new generation. Theyre called post millennial his. The generation z. Born from the mid late 1990s to the two thousands. Last year for the first time i had students who were born in the year 2000. I dont remember what i was doing the year 2000. [laughter] they take stands and voices loud enough to be heard by those of control and political spear. As i pointed out in my introduction. The cynical admired them. The patronizingly. Things will calm down when exam time comes. Or when summer comes. Or when they graduate. Privately however, many of us there elders, hope that they will light a fire and intimidate both of us and those who control our lives. We respect their integrity and voice. But rarely enough to leave our own jobs and careers or social positions to join them in the streets. All of us and be the unselfish courage of the young and their modest refusal to be considered exceptional. But suddenly arises in response to unexpected events and unanticipated tears in the fabric of their lives. Be they undocumented immigrants were comfortably situated americans. Is someone whos been teaching for decades, it was met elders when they were still teenagers, and has been continuous in all of their enthusiasm and curiosity and decency, i ask myself, what will happen to that enthusiasm when they get older. In our search for social and political stability, is the very nature of our democratic system to loophole political enthusiasm. To keep things steady, to keep the boat from rocking. If so, what we do when angry factions and leaders endanger the values that we are promised of. Who will resist the radical return to earlier and more merciless times. Only the kids. Thank you. [applause] i left the best parts out. [laughter] now i like to open up her questions. Carol clark is the colleague of mine at Amherst College but were still friends. [laughter] like the inmates. [laughter] i have two questions, one may be as an easy answer. And that is did the blind jock write his memoir. Yes when he did. I had to translate it. When he was about, when he died in his 40s. An automatic bill accident. And i said was when he driving. [laughter] when he died at home. When he, what happened is the government has a role that was still enforced at floor let no handicapped person could teach. And when he was a teacher, when he was a born teacher. So we can get a job. First when he went to greece, and then when he shame to america. Died in Hollins College and then when he went to case western and then when he went to you university of hawaii and taught friends chris. When he wrote memoirs. And there was light. For the bible. Yes, so a lot of this information i got from him or from people who knew him. The sensing and feeling and tasting and smelling. So as a result he has a certain reputation not only of blind people call him handicap but people who really believe that knowledge is more than just what we perceive. The other question is, what of the women, and what of the young women . Thats the last chapter of the book. Its called does resistance have a gender . Someone said thats patronizing putting this last chapter of the book as if you are sort of, i forgot i wrote a whole book i forgot i do talk about women. The reason i put it as the last chapter, women got no recognition after the war. Many of them had been very active in resistance. But after the war it was the man who got all the credit. We surprised about that . The men got the credit. The goal had 1050 roughly cope and loan abto give an award for having been crucial in resisting the germans. Six women in the thousands. So slowly these women are being recognized. Two of them, the remains were moved and another woman named a moved to ponte on three or four years ago. To what extent did the parents know that their children were engaged in these activities that were really crossing over the line, really could be extremely dangerous and to what extent did the kids know that if they were nabbed. Their parents could be. The german nazi mentality was such that dont just blame the kid, take out the entire family. To up substantial s extent in both cases, the parish where they are. All you have to do is find an ink mimeograph anyway spacer back totepaper basket in the room. These kids are wonderful kids but also dumb as hell in terms of protecting. They figured out the clock it exactly it might bring some people to check out whats going on. So they soon found out places to do the crack at executive. They were nacve, courageous but nacve. The parents would go and get upset and there be arguments, families broke up. There is one book written called the tulsa courage written a few years ago about a family of three, four, five, six, two parents and four kids, three of the kids joined resistance. They survived the war but the parents and older brother were arrested and executed. How do you think that makes you feel . They didnt participate in the resistance. There were examples of that. They were family arguments. There were splits and the other thing thats interesting about this book, i thought this was a five year period there is a lot of growing up in those five years. 13 to 18, 12 to 17, see how much i can do this. 11 to 16. [laughter] there is a lot of theres a lot of growing up, of maturing, learning more about yourself, self awareness to me that makes the story more fascinating but more difficult to grab. Its very hard to start with somebody who is 13 and think they will be the same five years later at 18. Thats whats interesting about this demographic. One interesting thing the word agile adolescent was not used. Until 1940 they started realizing that adolescents what we call adolescents needed more food than younger kids or adults. So for the first time they food tickets were young teenagers would get different type of food ticket. The first time a government has ever recognized the idea of an adolescent. Everyone was either a child or adult. There was no in between. The Bc Government realized that. Its an interesting phenomenon. One last question. One last, thats it . [laughter] mr. Riddell, an expert in radio, anything you want to know about the history of radio have to talk to this guy. Yes. How far after the war was the resistance really well known within france . Im wondering, it was the next generation that took to the streets in 1968 to protest. Were they aware of it . Their children. Thats the generation. All the french resisted. He knew he had a civil war on his hands. Between the communist and the centerright. So he immediately decided and there was an enormous reaction after the war. The quality purification when womens heads were shaved, of course women, mens heads were shaved. Any woman who had been associated with the german anyway, that doesnt mean slept with them maybe just being nice to them when they went to a store or something. There was a lot of kangaroo court. A lot of people were shot because they had supported the germans. But gall said, look, we were all resisters. We all resisted in some way. They brought it together. But the pain and the scar is still there. They still argue in their elections everything is always, whos responsible for what. Where was france . Was france