René Parodi

René Parodi (8 December 1904 – 16 April 1942) was a French magistrate, member of the French resistance and publisher of an underground newspaper during World War II. He was reportedly hanged after torture and imprisonment by the Gestapo.

Biography He was born in Rouen, the son of Marie Emilie Hélène Vavin (known as Hélène) and Dominique Parodi, a philosopher and a member of the Institut de France. His grandfather was the dramatist and poet Dominique-Alexandre Parodi and his brother was the senior civil servant Alexandre Parodi. He became a magistrate and was appointed to Châlons-sur-Marne, then to Reims and finally Versailles. He married Jeanne Tissot in January 1932. On the outbreak of World War II he volunteered as a soldier. When the armistice was agreed, he resumed his role as a magistrate. The first issue of the underground newspaper Résistance, displayed at the Russian ambassador's residence, Paris. At the end of 1940, he organised a group of resistance fighters to write propaganda and published the underground newspaper Résistance {see image). With Christian Pineau, he helped to create the Comité d’études économiques et syndicales (Economic and Trade Union Studies Committee) which became the Liberation-Nord movement. Parodi introduced the philosopher and epistemologist Jean Cavaillès to Pineau. From December 1941, Parodi was a member of the board of directors of the movement (along with Cavaillès). He was appointed as a substitute deputy at the tribunal of the Seine in June 1941 and he combined this work with that of Versailles and with his activity as a resistance fighter. During the summer of 1941, Liberation-Nord committed acts of sabotage, including sinking barges and blocking the Canal de Bourgogne at the Yonne river, a tributary of the Seine.

He was the father of the magistrate Claude Parodi.