Daniel Halévy (12 December 1872 – 4 February 1962) was a French

historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the st ...

Life

The son of

Ludovic Halévy Ludovic Halévy (1 January 1834 – 7 May 1908) was a French author and playwright, best known for his collaborations with Henri Meilhac on Georges Bizet's '' Carmen'' and on the works of Jacques Offenbach. Biography Ludovic Halévy was born in ...

, Daniel was born in and died in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

. His family was of Jewish descent, but his parents were Protestant and he was brought up as a Protestant. He studied at the

Lycée Condorcet The Lycée Condorcet () is a school founded in 1803 in Paris, France, located at 8, rue du Havre, in the city's 9th arrondissement. It is one of the four oldest high schools in Paris and also one of the most prestigious. Since its inception, var ...

, where he became friends with Marcel Proust. Social historians have acknowledged Halévy for his "Essai sur l'accélération de l'histoire" ''(Essay on the Acceleration of History)'', while he remains largely overlooked by literary scholars. He wrote a book, ''Degas parle''.... (''My Friend Degas'' in English), based on his journal notes as a teenager and man in his 20s. The book was revised and finished when he was in his late 80s. It was published in English in 1964. Edgar Degas was a close friend of Ludovic and a family friend too. With André Spire, whom he had met in the ''Cooperation des Idées'', he founded the Université populaire. Despite his early stand as a pro- Dreyfusard, he later became a supporter of the political right. Following the

6 February 1934 crisis 6 (six) is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7. It is a composite number and the smallest perfect number. In mathematics Six is the smallest positive integer which is neither a square number nor a prime number; it is the second small ...

, he lost all trust in parliamentary institutions. Despite his Jewish descent, he publicly declared that following 6 February 1934 he was now a "man of the extreme right". Although he personally abhorred Italian

Fascism Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy an ...

and German

National Socialism Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Naz ...

, he went on to support Marshal

Philippe Pétain Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Pétain (24 April 1856 – 23 July 1951), commonly known as Philippe Pétain (, ) or Marshal Pétain (french: Maréchal Pétain), was a French general who attained the position of Marshal of France at the end of Worl ...

Vichy regime Vichy France (french: Régime de Vichy; 10 July 1940 – 9 August 1944), officially the French State ('), was the fascist French state headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain during World War II. Officially independent, but with half of its ter ...

.See, inter alia, Mark Hulliung ''Citizens and citoyens: republicans and liberals in America and France'' (2002) at p. 158 The radicalisation of the right wing would accelerate after the election of the

Popular Front A popular front is "any coalition of working-class and middle-class parties", including liberal and social democratic ones, "united for the defense of democratic forms" against "a presumed Fascist assault". More generally, it is "a coalition ...

in 1936 and the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, link ...

(1936–39).

Works

* ''La vie de Frédéric

Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his car ...

'' (1909) * '' Vauban'' (1923) * ''Essai sur l'acceleration de l'histoire'' (1948) * '' Michelet'' (1928) * '' Pays parisiens'' (1932), autobiographical writings on his youth * ''Degas parle....'' (1960), In English ''My Friend Degas'' (1964)

Biographies

* Silvera, Alain. ''Daniel Halevy and His Times.'' Cornell University Press (1966)

External links

*
Georges Sorel, Letter to Daniel Halevy (1907)

References

1872 births 1962 deaths 20th-century French historians Historiographers French Protestants French people of German-Jewish descent Jewish historians French male non-fiction writers 20th-century French male writers {{France-historian-stub