‘They treat me more like a devil than a god’

03 December 2008

/article_images/articledir_6124/3062041/1_listing.jpg

Lloyd Evans finds that Bernard-Henri Lévy is not the ageing French dandy of caricature but a serious intellectual with views on everything from Barack Obama to the Muslim veil

Humanity is a face. Lévy has a knack for inventing phrases that cram a lot of intellectual distance into a short verbal leap. This makes him appealing to the media and, along with his racy looks and opulent lifestyle, accounts for his enormous celebrity in France. ‘They treat you like a god,’ I say. ‘More a devil than a god,’ he adds shrewdly, before I can write down, ‘Doesn’t demur when I call him a god.’ Is fame something he enjoys? ‘Enjoy is not the word. I don’t care for it much. Sometimes it is as if they spoke of someone other than myself. What I enjoy, what I want, is publicity for the causes I defend.’ His political activism sets him at variance with the image of the philosopher as a detached and solitary metaphysician. ‘You aren’t someone who sits in a dark room and just thinks.’ He bats the phrase back at me. ‘I don’t sit in a dark room. I stand in a dark world.’

To finish, I pose the obligatory ‘NUJ training’ query. ‘Is there anything else I should ask you?’ He seems moderately horrified at the thought of putting a question into my mouth. ‘Please, no. How can I permit myself this?’ he says with a show of humility which, in characteristic French fashion, seems to have descended from a great height. Finally, I muster the courage to put the ‘perfect hair’ quote to him. ‘Crazy,’ he says. ‘It’s not my humour. I can be much more funny about myself than that.’ But before I can ask for an example he whips his shades back on and melts into the darkness.

Previous page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4

More articles from: Lloyd Evans | this section

Print this article | Email to a friend | Permalink | Comments (8)

Post this entry to: del.icio.us | Digg | Newsvine | NowPublic | Reddit

Post comment

ian skidmore

December 4th, 2008 5:37pm Report this comment

you are fortunate to have met him. But why knock Brown ? He doesn't and the interview was about Levy

Dixon

December 4th, 2008 6:57pm Report this comment

He bears an uncanny resemblence to Robert De Nero, who of course IS The Devil ( AKA, Louis Cypher ).

Its the very notion of a "serious intellectual" that bothers me. I recommend Paul Johnsons examination of that breed in his book "Intellectiuals".

Michael hanlon

December 4th, 2008 7:57pm Report this comment

As well he got it out before Evans finished the "demur" note. He hadn't called him a god, he's suggested he was treated like a god.

Nicholas Storey

December 5th, 2008 1:55pm Report this comment

I mistrust the self-appointed guardians of our modern world - whether as with this chap, they are described as 'intellectuals' or, in the case of Jeremy Clarkson, they are described (or, rather, describe themselves)as the voice of common sense and the common sense of the reasonable man, at that. I mistrust them because they are packaged and sold to us in large doses and are about as useful as Mr Oliver's general approach of: 'bung it all in a bowl, give it a good old stir up and smack in the oven for 2-3 hours' to make a Xmas meal - but there is noi escape from these characters; their fatuous approaches; their serious or (as the case may be) smugly grinning faces and their damned opinions on the world, as though they are more worth having than Joe Bloggs'.

sean birnie

December 7th, 2008 9:32am Report this comment

"I point out that Muslim women don’t feel compelled to wear the veil but do so as an expression of individual liberty"

Really? What all of them? Do you have any proof for this absurdly generalised contention?

I know that journalists believe themselves to be above the normal conventions regarding burden of proof (or maybe just haven't figured out how to use google and post "links" to back up their claims).

So come on, where is the evidence that all the women of Iran, Saudi, Somalia, Pakistan, Sudan etc willing embrace the veil and the second class citizenship it clearly implies (as BHL eloquently points out) as a symbol of "liberty"?

What absolute poppycock.

Nicholas Storey

December 9th, 2008 2:49pm Report this comment

In reply to Sean Birnie: I hope that you are saying that the right to wear the Muslim veil should be a right of choice for Muslim women. But, the trouble is that it would then defeat its own purpose; this corollary, surely, is a matter for Muslim people to grapple with and to resolve (if it is capable of resolution). I am unconvinced that a French Jew is the man for the job - and, if one needs to talk about rights - who claims the qualification here, Mr Birnie?

Tina Trent

December 10th, 2008 6:17pm Report this comment

"I point out that Muslim women don’t feel compelled to wear the veil but do so as an expression of individual liberty."

I'm sorry, I don't understand. Something lost in the translation. Is Evans joking? Is this what passes for wit? Rumination? Journalism?

There are facts. Facts matter, right? And in reference to Afghanistan, and Iran, and elsewhere, saying such a thing isn't merely inaccurate: it is perverse. It isn't just denial; it is denial whipped into a joke, delivered as a punch line, which somehow makes it even worse.

And what bemused pleasure he seems to take saying it. Astonishing.