The White Rose Resistance Circle at the Oxford Literary Festival

Lecturer in German Alex Lloyd will be a speaker at this year’s Oxford Literary Festival, talking about her new book on Nazi resistance.

Defying Hitler: The White Rose Pamphlets (Bodleian Library Publishing, 2022) is a study of the White Rose (‘die Weiße Rose’) resistance circle, a group of students and a professor in Munich who, in the early 1940s, secretly wrote and distributed anti-Nazi pamphlets. Dr Lloyd looks at the history of the group and sets their resistance texts in the political and historical context of the day. The book includes modern translations of the pamphlets – as well as excerpts from the White Rose group’s letters – done collaboratively by undergraduates at the University of Oxford.

Dr Lloyd says: ‘This new book tells the story of the White Rose resistance circle – a network of individuals who used the power of the written word to speak out against Nazism. Their story impels us to ask questions about our own times and to reflect on how conscience and moral courage can lead to action that challenges injustice.’

Dr Lloyd’s talk at the Oxford Literary Festival will take place on Wednesday March 30 in the Weston Library. She leads the White Rose Project at Oxford, a research and engagement initiative to bring the story of the White Rose resistance group to English-speaking audiences through research, performance, and translation.