Third Douglas Johnson Memorial Lecture in French History
The Society for the Study of French History
and
The Institute of Historical Research, London
present:
Ruth Harris, Professor of European History and Fellow of New College, Oxford.
‘Rolland, Gandhi and Madeleine Slade: Spiritual Politics, France and the Wider World’.
Play Podcast of lecture via HistorySpot or download mp3 audio file
Synopsis:
Between 6 and 11 December in 1931, a remarkable meeting occurred between Mahatma Gandhi, the French intellectual and international pacifist Romain Rolland, and Madeleine Slade, the daughter of a British admiral. The encounter took place in Switzerland, after Gandhi had left the unsuccessful second Round-Table Conference on India in London. They came together through the good offices of Slade (re-named Mira Behn by Gandhi), who had been given as a ‘gift’ by Rolland to the Mahatma, and who now lived at the centre of Gandhi’s intimate entourage.
I will use this meeting to explore how the protagonists sought spiritual and aesthetic solutions to the encroaching global crisis, and to analyse the place of French intellectual culture in a worldwide interwar context. Rolland’s analysis of European and world affairs was ultimately ignored or misunderstood by the leader of the Indian national struggle, while the Frenchman also misconstrued Gandhi’s doctrine of non-violence (ahimsa). Although they shared many spiritual hopes, Rolland wish that Gandhi would take up the pacifist struggle against European fascism was proved a fantasy. In addition, neither man could appreciate the intimate yearnings of the aristocratic English woman whose personality was effaced by their explicit desire to make her a human bridge between East and West.
The connections between Rolland, Gandhi and Slade provide a way to examine the many links between world political systems, novel social experiments and individual spiritualities. Rolland’s privileged place as Gandhi’s French (and European) interlocutor reveals their mutual attempt to recover spirituality in order to bring the globe back from the brink of self-destruction. Their inability to align their efforts demonstrates the minefields of shifting political alignments and the problems posed by immense cultural divides.
Professor Ruth Harris
_______________________________
Other Lectures:
The First Douglas Johnson Annual Lecture:
The Society for the Study of French History and The Institute of Historical Research, London present:
Professor Julian Jackson (Queen Mary University of London), ‘The Century of Charles de Gaulle’ (November 2010).
[details and video/podcast of event]
The Second Douglas Johnson Annual Lecture:
The Society for the Study of French History and The Institute of Historical Research, London present:
Professor Richard Thomson (Edinburgh University), ‘New Wine in Old Bottles: Adapting and Abusing Tradition in French Visual Culture, 1880-1910’ (January 2012).
[details and podcast of event]
The Fourth Douglas Johnson Annual Lecture:
The Society for the Study of French History and The Institute of Historical Research, London present:
Professor Andrew Knapp (University of Reading), ‘Bombing and Memory: Britain and France, 1940-1945’ (January 2014).
[details and podcast of event]
The Fifth Douglas Johnson Annual Lecture:
The Society for the Study of French History, the Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France and The Institute of Historical Research, London present:
Professor John Horne, (Trinity College Dublin), ‘Myth or Model? The French Revolution in the Great War’ (January 2015).
[details and podcast of event]
