news that Pivot was ending his long seriesrnof Friday evening talk shows caused consternationrnin most publishing offices inrnParis. In a doomsday article published inrnLe Monde, its leading literary critic,rnBertrand Poirot-Delpech, described Pivot’srnannounced departure as a nationalrncalamity, since, almost single-handedly,rnhe had with his Friday evening talk showsrnkept alive an interest in buying and readingrnbooks which, without him, mightrnwell wither away into collective indifference.rnIn the end. Pivot relented, and Apostrophesrnvanished from the televisionrnscreens, replaced by a new, more “flexible”rntalk show, in which film stars, popularrnsingers, actors, scientists, doctors,rnpolificians turned authors, and of coursernwriters and poets of every kind were invitedrnto submit to intelligent interrogationrnin a new Friday evening feature cleverlyrnentitled Bouillon de culture (a standardrnlaboratory term for the bubbling liquid inrnwhich bacteriologists study the germinationrnand cultivafion of different kinds ofrngerms).rnThe Bouillon de culture session tornwhich Bernard-Henri Levy was invited,rnalong with three other authors who hadrnalso felt the need to write a book aboutrnJean-Paul Sartre, fully lived up to its bubblingrnname and effervescent connotation.rnWith his sharply cut profile, mobilerneyebrows forever frowning and unfrowning,rna floafing mane of dark hair, restlessrnorchestra-conductor’s hands, and an imperious,rnair-jabbing index finger, BHLrn(as he is now popularly called) was morernbrillianriy emphatic than ever, even if atrntimes far from convincing. For thernSartre, or more precisely the (differentlyrnfaceted) Sartres he was explaining andrndefending—warts, defects, deceptions,rnand all —was the same Sartre againstrnwhose intellectual tyranny—in praisingrnBrezhnev’s U.S.S.R., Mao Tse-tung’srnChina, and Fidel Castro’s Cuba —rnBernard-Henri Levy, Andre Glucksmann,rnand other young French philosophersrnhad revolted in the 1970’s.rnWithout actually extolling this famousrnphrase. Levy “understood” those who, inrnthe 1950’s and 60’s, used to say that theyrnwould “rather be wrong with Jean-PaulrnSartre than right with Raymond Aron”rn(or Albert Camus). For what in the “foggyrnfolly of the epoch” in which thernphilosopher lives is truly “right” ratherrnthan “wrong”? Even Raymond Aron wasrnnot infallible. And what, after all, wasrnRaymond Aron—a relafively straightforwardrnprofessor of sociology and politicalrnscience—compared to the omni-curious,rnomni-creating, omni-devouring, omniexperimentingrnJean-Paul Sartre? Inrnshort, Sartre’s errors were part of his polymathicrngenius —as novelist, playwright,rnessayist, journalist, philosopher, tirelessrnconversationalist, and, not least of all, anrninsatiably curious homme a femmes, orrnmore exactly a homme a jeunes filles,rnwhom he liked to “savor” with the relishrnof a gourmet, while maintaining a “necessary”rn(as opposed to “contingent”) friendshiprnwith his Castor (Eager Beaver),rnSimone de Beauvoir. A polymathic supermanrnof this kind —like Napoleon,rnSartre was almost a midget—has a divinernright to be wrongheaded. Like so manyrnothers, only more so. He also has a divinernright to deceive—others, even more thanrnhimselfrnEver since he publicly enunciated thisrnbasic modus operandi with the immortalrnwords “il ne faut pas desesperer Billancourt”rn(One must not drive the automobilernworkers of the Renault plant on thernSeine island of Billancourt to despair byrntelling them the ugly truth about concentrationrncamps, purges, and other horrorsrnin the U.S.S.R.), we knew that Sartre hadrnarrogated to himself the divine right torntell fibs. But what I did not know until Irnwatched this Bouillon de culture was that,rnfrom 1962 to 1968, Sartre was having anrnaffair with a lovely young Russian damselrnwho, Khrushchev’s and Brezhnev’srnU.S.S.R. being what it was, dutifully reportedrntheir pillow-cased or unpillowcasedrnconversations to the KGB. Sartre,rnit seems, was fully aware of it. Indeed, therntwo contingent lovers joyously connivedrnto make Sartre’s complaints and privaterndiatribes against life in the U.S.S.R. asrnblunt and unvarnished as possible —rnSartie, who was never happier than whenrnwielding a pen, going as far as to recordrnhis “seditious” sentiments in some 800rnpages of letters dispatched to his beloved.rnAlthough this was a very hush-hushrn”plot,” a friend of Sartre’s got wind ofrnwhat was going on, and when he askedrnJean-Paul why, if he felt this way aboutrnconditions in the U.S.S.R., he did notrnproclaim it openly, he was given thisrnexquisitely Sartrian reply: “Not on yourrnlife! If I did such a stupid thing, I wouldrnbe praised in the Figaro” (France’s mostrnrespectably bourgeois daily). And for arnbona fide, dyed-in-red-wool French intellectualrnof the 1960’s, to be praised in thernFigaro was tantamount to betiayal of thernproletariatrnYes, not only does a polymathic supermanrnof thinking have a divine right to deceivernothers as well as himself; he also hasrnthe right to stage a personal “cultural revolution”rnby dynamiting his own philosophyrnand blowing it sky-high. This ofrncourse requires real courage, a specialrnkind of heroism. For it is one thing tornepater le bourgeois (dumbfound the bourgeois)rn—this is virtually second nature tornany bona fide French left-wing intellectualrn—but it is quite another thing torndumbfound and dismay the members ofrnone’s ideological “family.” Which is preciselyrnwhat Sartre set out to do, in Marchrn1980, a few weeks before his death, whenrnhe began sending Le Nouvel Observateurrna series of “subversive” dialogues with arnfriend (whom he chose to rename BennyrnLevy), and which indicated, to the consternationrnof his closest friends, that hernwas parting company with what up untilrnthat moment had been regarded as hisrnphilosophy.rnFaced with this extraordinary case ofrnphilosophical hara-kiri, what is Bernard-rnHenri Levy’s reaction? One of painedrndisapproval? Of regret? Of disbelief?rnNot at all. Quite the contrary. But let usrnlisten to his reaction, gushing forth spontaneouslyrnin a torrent of tumbling, somersaultingrnwords, as recorded by a NouvelrnObservateur reporter:rnWliat an extraordinary adventure,rnafter all! Like Lacan, like Mao,rnSartre, in the evening of his life, decidesrnto smash everything. To therngreat dismay of his intellectual family,rnhe chooses to dynamite Sartrism.rnHe takes a bet—what a magnificentrnevent! —on a new youthrnand lays the cornerstones of a thirdrnedifice [the first being Heideggerianrn”existentialism,” the second hisrnbelated espousal of the cause of therndowntrodden and oppressed, ofrnFranz Fanon’s “the damned of thernearth”]. In a word, he again setsrnout on the roadways of his freedom.rnFinally, with Benny Levy acting asrna smuggler’s guide or mediator, herneffects, without saying so clearly, arnstrange philosophical junction withrnEmmanuel Levinas. All of this isrnstupendously romantic: a youngrnMaoist chieftain plots his last conspiracyrnand passes on to the oldrnphilosopher [i.e., the aging Sartre]rnconcepts—those of Levinas—withrnwhich his dismantled thinking isrngoing to be rebuilt. The demoli-rn)UNE 2000/35rnrnrn