Bernard-Henri Lévy

Bernard-Henri Lévy
Bernard-Henri Lévy is a philosopher and writer whose works deal broadly with issues of human dignity. In word and deed he carries on the tradition of the engaged intellectual established by André Malraux, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Albert Camus. In his first visit to the emerging Bangladesh as a correspondent for the daily newspaper Combat; in his investigation in Pakistan into the death of Daniel Pearl; in repeated visits to Sarajevo under siege by Serb militias; in his immersion in the "forgotten wars" of Africa and Latin America; in interviews with survivors of the Tutsi genocide in Rwanda and of the Armenian genocide; in his involvement, from the very first, in the Libyan people's struggle against Khaddafi; and, most recently, at the side of the pro-European Ukrainians to whom he pays tribute in his play, Hotel Europe, Bernard-Henri Lévy has ceaselessly devoted his talent, energy, and courage to causes he believed just. A philosophy graduate of the Ecole Normale Supérieure, a writer, novelist, journalist, intellectual agitator, filmmaker, activist, and founder of the review La RÃ¨gle du Jeu, BHL is a columnist for Le Point, Corriere della Sera, El Pais (Madrid), as well as other publications for which he provides weekly commentary on politics, culture, and the arts—among them the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Huffington Post, Daily Beast, Haaretz, Aftenposten, Espressen de Stockolm, and New Republic. A particular preoccupation of his work is the idea of evil. For BHL, the twentieth century was the century of evil: Fascism, totalitarianism, terrorism, and nativism are the successive forms in which that evil has appeared—and continues to appear in the early decades of the twenty-first century.

ARTICLES BY: Bernard-Henri Lévy

June 27, 2016 1:52 am

Brexit Does Not Signal the Victory of ‘Another Europe,’ But of ‘No Europe at All’

Thursday’s Brexit marks a victory not of the people but of populism. Not of democracy but of demagogy. It is a victory of the hard Right over...

April 25, 2016 11:12 am

Bernard-Henri Lévy: ‘Hijab Day’ at Sciences Po

I realize that this is a minor event that has no more importance than we are willing, here and elsewhere, to give it. And yet I...

March 4, 2016 4:52 pm

Bernard-Henri Lévy: A Fateful Choice for Europe

One country of the European Union recalls its ambassador from another country of the Union. Another, or the same, becomes, in defiance of every rule...

January 28, 2016 1:42 pm

Bernard-Henri Lévy: Death’s Siren Song, Life’s Noble Rhythm

The rhythmic litany of deaths chanted out in the press in recent weeks has had a strange effect. David Bowie is dead. Pierre Boulez is dead. Michel Tournier...

January 21, 2016 10:30 am

Bernard-Henri Lévy: The Metaphysics of the Yarmulke

What a strange debate has been going on in France. A cacaphony, really — about the yarmulke! There are the good doctors, notably Rony Brauman, founder of...

January 5, 2016 7:29 am

Bernard-Henri Lévy: The World Must Stand Up to Saudi Arabia

Iran is no paragon of democracy. And when its leaders denounce the “criminal workings” of the “vile” Saudi regime and its links to terrorism, the pot...

October 21, 2015 3:16 pm

Bernard-Henri Lévy: Things We Need to Stop Hearing About the ‘Stabbing Intifada’

It is painful to hear the phrase “lone wolves” applied to the handful — and perhaps tomorrow the dozens and then the hundreds — of...

November 25, 2014 11:15 am

Bernard-Henri Lévy: Israel, Palestine, and the French Legislature: ‘He Who Would Act the Angel, Acts the Brute’

For nearly half a century I have favored the two-state solution. But I believe that the "unilateral recognition" of Palestine under consideration in the French...