Why should an intellectual have to renounce the pleasures of life? I am not a hermit. I am a man of flesh and blood. In fact, if you look at my name in French, that schizophrenia, that aspiration to several lives is contained in my name. Lévy is also les vies – “the lives”.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVYI definitely don’t agree with that sort of rhetoric from the United States – this idea that all the major conflicts of our age need to be solved militarily.
More Bernard-Henri Levy Quotes
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In general, Europeans need to get a wider perspective on the problem of Islamism.
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You can be horrified by the state of the prisons, the misery in certain neighborhoods of its cities, or their level of poverty.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY -
I would sooner want a strong partnership with the United States – even with (US President George W.) Bush, who I think is the worst president in a long, long time. I would sooner want a friendship with Bush than with (Russian President Vladimir) Putin.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY -
I work even when I am on vacation. You know that line by Stéphane Mallarmé, “All earthly existence must ultimately be contained in a book”? I am the kind of person who finds life interesting only if it is translated into writing, if it is parsed into words.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY -
I definitely don’t agree with that sort of rhetoric from the United States – this idea that all the major conflicts of our age need to be solved militarily.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY -
For me, dressing is always a question of principle, respect, a sense of order, not to disguise myself, even in rotten places.
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It’s true that in France there is always this ridiculous complex about money. Money is cursed, shameful, money disqualifies you . . . In America, even though it is a Protestant country, it’s the opposite.
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I really like the United State, its relationship to space and time, its interest in mobility, its cosmopolitanism.
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France is a country where thinking is supposed to be furtive, invisible, almost clandestine. France is a country of cliques and sects.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY -
God is dead but my hair is perfect.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY -
The totalitarian state is not a force unleashed, the truth is in chains.
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I would hope that Europe always has a privileged relationship with the United States. The alternatives are not attractive.
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I am 60, and I am as much an internationalist as when I was younger, when I was a Marxist-Leninist. Internationalism is one of the rare pieces of that heritage to which I remain loyal. That is Barack Obama’s strength.
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A politician has finally understood that politics is not only about the closing of a mine in Ohio-it is also about the will to reach out, to embrace the world of today’s young Americans. That way, young Americans may eventually reconcile with politics.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY -
America creates myths by focusing a lot of energy on its history and using it – – not always, but sometimes – for constructive purposes.
BERNARD-HENRI LEVY