Enzo Traverso

He is the author of several books on critical theory, the Holocaust, Marxism, memory, totalitarianism, revolution, and contemporary historiography. His books have been translated into numerous languages. After living and working in France for over 25 years, he is currently the Susan and Barton Winokur Professor in the Humanities at Cornell University.

Enzo Traverso
Born	(1957-10-14) October 14, 1957 (age 66) Gavi, Piedmont, Italy
Nationality	Italian
Education	PhD, École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS), M.A. (Laurea), University of Genoa
Occupation	Historian
Employer	Cornell University

Enzo Traverso obtained a master's degree (Laurea) in modern history at the University of Genoa (Italy) in 1982. After moving to Paris in 1985 to further pursue his academic trajectory he completed his PhD program at School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS) in 1989, under the direction of Michael Löwy. In 2009 he achieved the academic qualification of habilitation (accreditation to supervise research).

From 1989 through 1991, he worked for the International Institute for Research and Education (IIRE) based in Amsterdam, and after that in the Library of contemporary international documentation (BDIC) in Nanterre. He also held the position of a lecturer in the Departement of Political science at the University of Paris VIII (1993–1995) and at School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS) (1994–1997). In 1995 he was hired by the University of Picardie Jules Verne in Amiens as an assistant professor. He was later promoted to full professor, a post he held from 2009 to 2013, when he joined the faculty at Cornell. In 2014, he was awarded the Premio Pozzale Luigi Russo [it] and in 2016, the Huésped de Honor Extraordinario, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, in recognition of his historical scholarship.

Original works

• Revolution: An Intellectual History, Verso, 2021, ISBN 978-1839763335.
• Left-Wing Melancholia: Marxism, History, and Memory (New Directions in Critical Theory), Columbia University Press; 2nd Revised ed., 2017, ISBN 978-0231179423.
• Les Marxistes et la question juive, La Brèche-PEC, Montreuil, 1990.
• Les Juifs et l'Allemagne, de la symbiose judéo-allemande à la mémoire d'Auschwitz, La Découverte, Paris, 1992.
• Siegfried Kracauer. Itinéraire d’un intellectuel nomade, La Découverte, Paris, 1994.
• L'Histoire déchirée, essai sur Auschwitz et les intellectuels, Éditions du Cerf, Paris, 1997.
• Pour une critique de la barbarie moderne : écrits sur l'histoire des Juifs et l'antisémitisme, Éditions Page deux (Cahiers libres), Lausanne, 2000.
• Le Totalitarisme : Le XXe siècle en débat, 2001.
• La Violence nazie : Essai de généalogie historique, 2002, La Fabrique, Paris.
• La Pensée dispersée : Figures de l'exil judéo-allemand, 2004.
• Le Passé, mode d'emploi : Histoire, mémoire, politique, 2005, La Fabrique, Paris.
• À Feu et à sang : De la guerre civile européenne, 1914-1945, Stock, Paris, 2007.
• L'histoire comme champ de bataille : Interpréter les violences du XXe siècle, La Découverte, Paris, 2011.
• La fin de la modernité juive : Histoire d'un tournant conservateur, La Découverte, Paris, 2013.
• Mélancolie de gauche : La force d’une tradition cachée (XIXe-XXIe siècle), La Découverte, Paris, 2016.
• Les nouveaux visages du fascisme, Textuel, 2017

English translations

• Singular Past: The I in the Historiography, transl. from the French by Adam Schoene, Columbia University Press, 2022.
• The Jewish Question: History of a Marxist Debate, Brill, Leiden, 2018
• The End of Jewish Modernity, Pluto Press, London, 2016, translated by David Fernbach.
• Fire and Blood: The European Civil War, 1914–1945, Verso, 2016
• The Origins of Nazi Violence, New Press, 2003, translated by Janet Lloyd.
• Understanding the Nazi Genocide: Marxism after Auschwitz, Pluto Press, London, 1999, translated by Peter Drucker.
• The Jews & Germany: From the "Judeo-German Symbiosis" to the Memory of Auschwitz, U. of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, 1995, translated by Daniel Weissbort.
• The Marxists and the Jewish question. The history of a Debate (1843-1943), Humanities Press, New Jersey, 1994, translated by Bernard Gibbons, ISBN 0-391-03806-0