Henry Rousso - The Latest Catastrophe

This book was a long time coming to fruition, and it is therefore impossible to cite here all those who contributed to my thinking at one moment or another. The Institut dHistoire du Temps Prsent (IHTP) has always been my intellectual and professional environment, and I am grateful in the first place to its founder, Franois Bdarida, who died prematurely and whose memory I associate with that of Michael Pollak, Michel Trebitsch, and Karel Bartosek, all of whom also passed away too soon. I would also like to mention Marianne Ranson, who was there from the beginning, as well as Robert Frank, Denis Peschanski, Jean-Pierre Rioux, and Danile Voldman, in memory of the early days, in addition to Jean Astruc, Gabrielle Muc, Anne-Marie Path, and lonore Testa. In the writing phase these last few years, I have benefited from day-to-day exchanges with Christian Ingrao, the current director of the IHTP, Fabrice dAlmeida, Vincent Auzas, Alain Bancaud, Rmy Besson, Anne Boigeol, Olivier Bttner, Juliette Denis, Catherine Hass, Anne Kerlan, Anne Protin-Dumon, Malika Rahal, and Fabien Thofilakis. My thanks to Caroline Chanteloup, Valrie Hugonnard, Morgane Jouve, Nicolas Schmidt, and Boris Videmann for their assistance.

For our many discussions about the practice of history, I owe a special debt of gratitude to Christian Delage and Peter Schttler. Also to Christian Delacroix, Franois Dosse, and Patrick Garcia (who was kind enough to read through the manuscript); their seminar on historiography provided fertile soil for this books development.

I have benefited greatly from the close and regular ties with my friends at the European Network for Contemporary History (EURHISTXX), which I coordinate within the CNRS: Peter Apor, Paolo Capuzzo, Martin Conway, Norbert Frei, John Horne, Constantin Iordachi, Michael Kopecek, Konrad Jarausch, Pieter Lagrou, Marie-Claire Lavabre, Thomas Lindenberger, Guillaume Mouralis, Peter Romijn, Mariuccia Salvati, and Dariusz Stola.

Then, too, I would like to mention a few people who directly or indirectly contributed to this book: in the first place, Stphane Audoin-Rouzeauwho was also kind enough to be one of its first readersand Annette Becker, with whom (along with Nicole Edelman) I have long conducted a seminar at the Universit de Nanterre. My thanks as well to Marc Abels, Ora Avni, Jean-Pierre Azma, Franois Azouvi, Omer Bartov, Leora Bilsky, Nathan Bracher, Bruno Chaouat, Myriam Chimnes, Jean-Marc Coicaud, ric Conan, Olivier Dumoulin, Marc Ferro, tienne Franois, Valeria Galimi, Antoine Garapon, Richard J. Golsan, Franois Hartog, Gerhard Hirschfeld, Bogumil Jewsiewicki, Alice Kaplan (who helped me so much for the American edition), Gerd Krumeich, Grard Lenclud, Jocelyn Ltourneau, Michael R. Marrus, Bertrand Muller, Pierre Nora, Michel Offerl, Pascal Ory, Robert O. Paxton, Philippe Petit, Krzysztof Pomian, Rene Poznanski, Donald M. Reid, Philippe Roussin, Jean-Franois Sirinelli, Zeev Sternhell, Benjamin Stora, Susan Suleiman, Nicolas Werth, and Eli Zaretski.

I also wish to express my gratitude to Francis Hofstein, with whom I was able to find a few words to express the weight of the past.

Finally, to Hlne, who suffered stoically through the ordeal of a constantly unfinished book, and to Linda, because the future is not only an illusion of yesteryear.