Roderick Kedward (historian)
Encyclopedia
Harry Roderick Kedward is a British historian.
, Kent, Kedward spent his early life in Goldthorpe
(Yorkshire
), Tenterden
(Kent) and in Bath where he obtained a scholarship to attend Kingswood School
.
He then studied at Worcester College
and St Antony's College
, Oxford before being recruited as a lecturer at the University of Sussex
in 1962. He became Professor of History in 1991.
Kedward developed into one of the most prominent Anglophone historians of France. A specialist on Vichy France
and the Resistance
he has also published a 740 page history of 20th century France, under the title La Vie en Bleu.
At the heart of Kedward's writing is a concern for ordinary people: how they experienced dramatic historical events and how they themselves became actors in these events. Oral history
has therefore formed a central part of Kedward's historical approach, as he has interviewed hundreds of ordinary Frenchmen and women about their experience of being in the Resistance
.
This view was reiterated by an anonymous reviewer in The Economist
: "he thoroughly understands French history, and is able to show how people in a country in difficulties can come to terms with their present by reflecting on their past". This same reviewer was full of praise for the book’s methodology finding in Kedward: "an exemplar to scholars of how to treat almost intractable material". Using oral history had given considerable vitality to the study in the eyes of the Times Higher Education Supplement, "Kedward brings the period alive as a result of his many interviews with former résistants". Kedward had attempted to allow different voices to emerge but for Maurice Larkin he had been a little bit over-indulgent in accepting the Communist party’s stance: "He tries very hard to be fair to everyone – perhaps, some may think, a little too benignly in his account of communist behaviour in 1940–41".
Kedward was given support in France by Henry Rousso
who described it in 1982 as a "little known work, full of original ideas". Rousso, although from a French family, had been born in Egypt
and lived in New York, so spoke fluent English. The book had to wait over ten years for a French translation. Julian T. Jackson
explained the long wait by the fact that at that time the French academic community was much more focused on the study of Vichy which Robert Paxton
had revitalised than on reviewing the history of the Resistance. Paxton, he explained, "wrote the right book at the right time, Kedward the right one at the wrong time".
When a French translation was published, Jean-Pierre Azéma wrote a preface for it. Azéma began this by listing all the reasons why the book had not so far been bedtime reading in France. The first was obviously a linguistic one with few French scholars of Azéma’s generation showing much inclination to read in English. But there were also reasons related to the subject matter- Resistance in Vichy France was a book limited geographically to the study of the unoccupied zone and chronologically to the years 1940–1942 which most would consider as the nadir of Resistance
activity.
Azéma went on to highlight the originality of the book, describing it as "a book of the highest quality which will become a reference". He ended the preface by thanking the publisher for having given the French public access to a truly "pioneering study". A similar baton was taken up by French reviewers once this translation became available. Jean-Pierre Rioux in Le Monde
of 20 October 1989 described it as "a work which appeared in 1978 and has become a classic in the eyes of specialists and all praise must go to Champ Vallon for having at last commissioned its translation". He praised its challenge to received ideas and its "remarkable understanding" of historical situations.
underlined that it was a "book that is not only remarkably well-documented but also perceptive and moving". The writer Francis Hodgson described the text as a "Maquisard history of the Maquis, and a very fine one".
According to John Simmonds "Kedward has written an extraordinary book, which maintains strong elements missing from much history of the times, such as the role of women in the Resistance". Simmonds underlined the skill with which Kedward conjoined different periods of history, his "ability to link this type of refusal with the revolts of the 18th Century Camisards in the Cévennes and the radicalism of 19th and 20th century rural movements". Sarah Fishman described the book as an "exceptional historical analysis". She praised its "nuanced and rich portrait of life in Vichy France" and underlined that "Kedward’s sensitivity to issues of rhetoric and discourse leads to rich descriptions of the complexities and subtleties of public opinion". For Fishman "Kedward’s work, in sum, is an eloquent and subtle example of the third phase into which historiography is moving. From mythmaking to mythbreaking".
Again the book was well-received in France where it was translated more rapidly than his previous monograph under the title A la recherche du Maquis. In Libération
on 23 September 1999, Olivier Wieviorka predicted classic status would befall A la recherche du Maquis. Laurent Douzou in his review of the Maquis book for Le Monde
of 10 September found it astonishing that a foreign historian should have such an intimate understanding and knowledge of rural France. Perceptively he added: "To pull off such a triumph, without doubt one must love this history, its actors and the countryside in which it was performed".
.
Despite retiring in 2002 he is continuing his research into Twentieth Century France. Kedward is now Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Sussex
.
He is the grandson of Roderick Morris Kedward
(1881–1937), Liberal MP for Ashford
, Kent between 1929 and 1931. He married sociology lecturer Carol Wimbleton in 1965 and they have two children Joshua and Jessica.
Biography
Born in March 1937 at HawkhurstHawkhurst
Hawkhurst is a village and civil parish in the borough of Tunbridge Wells, Kent, England. The parish lies to the south-east of Tunbridge Wells. Hawkhurst itself is virtually two villages...
, Kent, Kedward spent his early life in Goldthorpe
Goldthorpe
Goldthorpe is a village within the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley, in South Yorkshire, England. Anciently a small medieval farming village, Goldthorpe is recorded in the Domesday Book and was under the Manor of Bolton upon Dearne which was once owned by Roger de Busli.Goldthorpe railway station...
(Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
), Tenterden
Tenterden
Tenterden is a Cinque Port town in the Ashford District of Kent, England. It stands on the edge of the Weald, overlooking the valley of the River Rother....
(Kent) and in Bath where he obtained a scholarship to attend Kingswood School
Kingswood School
Kingswood School, referred to as 'Kingswood', is an independent day and boarding school located in Bath, Somerset, England. The school is coeducational and educates some 950 children aged 3 to 18. It is notable for being founded by John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, in 1748...
.
He then studied at Worcester College
Worcester College, Oxford
Worcester College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. The college was founded in the eighteenth century, but its predecessor on the same site had been an institution of learning since the late thirteenth century...
and St Antony's College
St Antony's College, Oxford
St Antony's College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England.St Antony's is the most international of the seven all-graduate colleges of the University of Oxford, specialising in international relations, economics, politics, and history of particular parts of the...
, Oxford before being recruited as a lecturer at the University of Sussex
University of Sussex
The University of Sussex is an English public research university situated next to the East Sussex village of Falmer, within the city of Brighton and Hove. The University received its Royal Charter in August 1961....
in 1962. He became Professor of History in 1991.
Kedward developed into one of the most prominent Anglophone historians of France. A specialist on Vichy France
Vichy France
Vichy France, Vichy Regime, or Vichy Government, are common terms used to describe the government of France that collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944. This government succeeded the Third Republic and preceded the Provisional Government of the French Republic...
and the Resistance
French Resistance
The French Resistance is the name used to denote the collection of French resistance movements that fought against the Nazi German occupation of France and against the collaborationist Vichy régime during World War II...
he has also published a 740 page history of 20th century France, under the title La Vie en Bleu.
At the heart of Kedward's writing is a concern for ordinary people: how they experienced dramatic historical events and how they themselves became actors in these events. Oral history
Oral history
Oral history is the collection and study of historical information about individuals, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews...
has therefore formed a central part of Kedward's historical approach, as he has interviewed hundreds of ordinary Frenchmen and women about their experience of being in the Resistance
French Resistance
The French Resistance is the name used to denote the collection of French resistance movements that fought against the Nazi German occupation of France and against the collaborationist Vichy régime during World War II...
.
Resistance in Vichy France
When Resistance in Vichy France was published in 1978 its quality was widely applauded. Joanna Richardson found it "solid and imaginative", Maurice Larkin described it as "stimulating and unpretentious" and John Horne praised its "admirable subtlety". For G.M. Hamburg the book had captured Vichy France in all of its complexity: "Kedward’s study of French idealism and opportunism gives a more complicated, but a more accurate picture of the motivations behind the resistance than is available in other histories". Critics particularly enjoyed Kedward’s linking of the history of the distant and recent past. M.R.D. Foot underlined that: "Mr Kedward’s great advantage when he writes about politics is that he understands history. One of his book’s main virtues is that he shows how much people of southern France in those years of defeat and despair were conscious of, and sustained by, the knowledge of previous national catastrophes and of the traditional remedies for them."This view was reiterated by an anonymous reviewer in The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
: "he thoroughly understands French history, and is able to show how people in a country in difficulties can come to terms with their present by reflecting on their past". This same reviewer was full of praise for the book’s methodology finding in Kedward: "an exemplar to scholars of how to treat almost intractable material". Using oral history had given considerable vitality to the study in the eyes of the Times Higher Education Supplement, "Kedward brings the period alive as a result of his many interviews with former résistants". Kedward had attempted to allow different voices to emerge but for Maurice Larkin he had been a little bit over-indulgent in accepting the Communist party’s stance: "He tries very hard to be fair to everyone – perhaps, some may think, a little too benignly in his account of communist behaviour in 1940–41".
Kedward was given support in France by Henry Rousso
Henry Rousso
Henry Rousso is a contemporary French historian specializing in World War II France.He studied at the École normale supérieure de Saint-Cloud, the Sorbonne, and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris....
who described it in 1982 as a "little known work, full of original ideas". Rousso, although from a French family, had been born in Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
and lived in New York, so spoke fluent English. The book had to wait over ten years for a French translation. Julian T. Jackson
Julian T. Jackson
Julian T. Jackson is a prominent British historian. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and of the Royal Historical Society. Professor of History at Queen Mary, University of London Julian Jackson is one of the leading authorities on twentieth-century France.He was educated at the University of...
explained the long wait by the fact that at that time the French academic community was much more focused on the study of Vichy which Robert Paxton
Robert Paxton
Robert O. Paxton is an American political scientist and historian specializing in Vichy France, fascism and Europe during the World War II era...
had revitalised than on reviewing the history of the Resistance. Paxton, he explained, "wrote the right book at the right time, Kedward the right one at the wrong time".
When a French translation was published, Jean-Pierre Azéma wrote a preface for it. Azéma began this by listing all the reasons why the book had not so far been bedtime reading in France. The first was obviously a linguistic one with few French scholars of Azéma’s generation showing much inclination to read in English. But there were also reasons related to the subject matter- Resistance in Vichy France was a book limited geographically to the study of the unoccupied zone and chronologically to the years 1940–1942 which most would consider as the nadir of Resistance
French Resistance
The French Resistance is the name used to denote the collection of French resistance movements that fought against the Nazi German occupation of France and against the collaborationist Vichy régime during World War II...
activity.
Azéma went on to highlight the originality of the book, describing it as "a book of the highest quality which will become a reference". He ended the preface by thanking the publisher for having given the French public access to a truly "pioneering study". A similar baton was taken up by French reviewers once this translation became available. Jean-Pierre Rioux in Le Monde
Le Monde
Le Monde is a French daily evening newspaper owned by La Vie-Le Monde Group and edited in Paris. It is one of two French newspapers of record, and has generally been well respected since its first edition under founder Hubert Beuve-Méry on 19 December 1944...
of 20 October 1989 described it as "a work which appeared in 1978 and has become a classic in the eyes of specialists and all praise must go to Champ Vallon for having at last commissioned its translation". He praised its challenge to received ideas and its "remarkable understanding" of historical situations.
In Search of the Maquis
In the mid-1980s Kedward suffered a heart problem which almost killed him. The research on his next major monograph which was drawing to a close at that point was put on hold and it was not until 1993 that In Search of the Maquis came out. Again the reviews were very positive. Douglas JohnsonDouglas Johnson
Douglas Johnson , a British historian, was born in Edinburgh in 1925. He attended the Royal Grammar School, Lancaster, and then Worcester College, Oxford, on a history scholarship...
underlined that it was a "book that is not only remarkably well-documented but also perceptive and moving". The writer Francis Hodgson described the text as a "Maquisard history of the Maquis, and a very fine one".
According to John Simmonds "Kedward has written an extraordinary book, which maintains strong elements missing from much history of the times, such as the role of women in the Resistance". Simmonds underlined the skill with which Kedward conjoined different periods of history, his "ability to link this type of refusal with the revolts of the 18th Century Camisards in the Cévennes and the radicalism of 19th and 20th century rural movements". Sarah Fishman described the book as an "exceptional historical analysis". She praised its "nuanced and rich portrait of life in Vichy France" and underlined that "Kedward’s sensitivity to issues of rhetoric and discourse leads to rich descriptions of the complexities and subtleties of public opinion". For Fishman "Kedward’s work, in sum, is an eloquent and subtle example of the third phase into which historiography is moving. From mythmaking to mythbreaking".
Again the book was well-received in France where it was translated more rapidly than his previous monograph under the title A la recherche du Maquis. In Libération
Libération
Libération is a French daily newspaper founded in Paris by Jean-Paul Sartre and Serge July in 1973 in the wake of the protest movements of May 1968. Originally a leftist newspaper, it has undergone a number of shifts during the 1980s and 1990s...
on 23 September 1999, Olivier Wieviorka predicted classic status would befall A la recherche du Maquis. Laurent Douzou in his review of the Maquis book for Le Monde
Le Monde
Le Monde is a French daily evening newspaper owned by La Vie-Le Monde Group and edited in Paris. It is one of two French newspapers of record, and has generally been well respected since its first edition under founder Hubert Beuve-Méry on 19 December 1944...
of 10 September found it astonishing that a foreign historian should have such an intimate understanding and knowledge of rural France. Perceptively he added: "To pull off such a triumph, without doubt one must love this history, its actors and the countryside in which it was performed".
Later life
Kedward has obtained numerous awards including the Prix Philippe Viannay (2005) for his book A la recherche du maquis. The French government awarded him the title of Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Académiques in recognition of his services to French history. Some of his former students and colleagues grouped together to put together a festscrift for him. This came out with the publisher Berg in 2005 under the title Vichy, Resistance, Liberation, co-edited by Hanna Diamond and Simon KitsonSimon Kitson
Simon Kitson is a British historian.Kitson did his undergraduate studies at the University of Ulster and his post-graduate studies at the University of Sussex, under the supervision of Professor Roderick Kedward...
.
Despite retiring in 2002 he is continuing his research into Twentieth Century France. Kedward is now Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Sussex
University of Sussex
The University of Sussex is an English public research university situated next to the East Sussex village of Falmer, within the city of Brighton and Hove. The University received its Royal Charter in August 1961....
.
He is the grandson of Roderick Morris Kedward
Roderick Kedward (politician)
Rev. Roderick Morris Kedward was a Wesleyan minister and a Liberal Party politician in the United Kingdom....
(1881–1937), Liberal MP for Ashford
Ashford, Kent
Ashford is a town in the borough of Ashford in Kent, England. In 2005 it was voted the fourth best place to live in the United Kingdom. It lies on the Great Stour river, the M20 motorway, and the South Eastern Main Line and High Speed 1 railways. Its agricultural market is one of the most...
, Kent between 1929 and 1931. He married sociology lecturer Carol Wimbleton in 1965 and they have two children Joshua and Jessica.