​The publication of this book coincided with the anniversary of the centenary of Édith Piaf’s birth in 1915, in Belleville, Paris. Although retaining Piaf as an iconic figure on the French stage, and the Parisian one in particular, David Looseley expands her influence and demonstrates her role as a ‘passeur’ on the international stage and a cultural phenomenon. 

This cultural study is written with scrupulous attention to detail and accuracy and has a comprehensive chronology, notes and index.

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David Looseley, Édith Piaf: A Cultural History (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2015). Hardback, 254 pages, no illustrations                  
The book will be on sale that evening at £20.00 instead of the original price £25.00. 
Picture
Prof. D. Looseley receiving the FBS book prize from Mme L'Ambassadeur at the French Residence- April 2016
David Looseley was born and educated in South-East London. Graduating from the University of Exeter in 1971 in French (with English), he obtained a Masters in 1974 for work on Sartre, Camus and de Beauvoir, and a doctorate in 1982 on the 20th-century dramatist Armand Salacrou. He began his teaching career at the University of Dijon, then took up successive posts at the Universities of Exeter, Huddersfield and Bradford, before coming to Leeds in 1994, where he taught for fifteen years and is now an active emeritus researcher, writer and translator. He is also Associate Fellow of the Centre for Cultural Policy Studies, University of Warwick (2010-2013) and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Bristol. He has been visiting professor at the Universities of Strasbourg, Complutense in Madrid and visiting research scholar at the Remarque Institute, New York University. In 2012, he returned to Complutense to take up a visiting professorship funded by the Spanish government.
In 2005 David founded the Popular Cultures Research Network, today an international, interdisciplinary community of researchers, postgraduates and practitioners. In 2010, he was decorated by the French government for services to French culture, becoming Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Académiques.