Quotessence
Home / Topics / France Quotes

France Quotes

Browse 1398 quotes about France.

Related topics

France Quotes

“I'd been influenced by reading books on art and colonies that existed in Paris and places like that and so when I came to Europe I came to France and I had very little money, and I had to live low and stayed in a bohemian section of Paris with a lot of other students, who were from medical school, science school and art school. We all lived in a kind of communal way and I was challenged politically, because I didn't have a clue and they would ask me questions about the Algerian War, which was very big in France in the late '50s.”

“I was raised in California during the Second World War and into the '50s and everything was fine, everything was great. The sun always shone, everybody looked healthy and wore ties and smoked in restaurants, and there were cars for everybody - except us, because I came from a lower class neighbourhood. But [in France] I realised there was a different point of view, so when I came back to America a year and a half later I was much more focused on my own country culturally and politically.”

“I think that both Russia and other international actors, including those who are more actively engaged in the resolution of the Ukrainian crisis (that is the Federal Republic of Germany and France, the so-called Normandy Quartet, certainly, with close involvement of the United States, and we have intensified our dialogue on this issue), we should all be committed to the full and unconditional implementation of the agreements that were achieved in Minsk. The Minsk Agreements have to be implemented.”

“In France those absurd perversions of the art of war which covered themselves under the name of chivalry were more omnipotent than in any other country of Europe. The strength of the armies of Philip and John of Valois was composed of a fiery and undisciplined aristocracy which imagined itself to be the most efficient military force in the world, but which was in reality little removed from an armed mob.”

“I don't know what my image is. I went to France to publicize Marvin's Room, and one really smart young woman journalist said to me, "You know, when I told people I was going to interview Meryl Streep they were so excited... all ze women in my office, they love you so much. But ze men - they are afraid of you."”

“I guess it's interesting traveling, for me, because I never in my life until doing this felt a sense of being from anywhere particularly, whereas now I do feel quite European. Even if we don't get up to England, if we're in France or somewhere like that, it feels more like going back somewhere familiar - more than even America, where we share a lot of cultural stuff.”

“In particular, recently Belgium has banned the sale of a cellphone to a 7-year-old. Turkey has banned ads and advertising to children. So has France for children under 12. India has bans in certain areas. In Bangalore, you cannot sell a cellphone to someone younger than 16. So in different parts of the world, they've taken different steps.”

“I went back to photography in the 1990s. But from the 60s to the 90s I didn't really take any photographs at all, unfortunately. During that period I lived in France, I lived in England, I lived all over the place in different cities. I didn't take any photographs and because I felt I had really accomplished everything that I wanted to in photography during the period between 61 and 67.”

“I was born in the south of France, I moved to Paris 30 years ago. I was running nightclubs and restaurants, so that was my business - working until six o'clock every morning, and then one day I noticed my wife. We opened the gallery together. She got pregnant, she was 22, I was 35, and it was time for me to change my life, and I decided to wake up early - wake up at the time I used to sleep.”

“Even under the British there were hostile groups. There were clashes. But, as we found out later, these were clashes provoked by those who had no wish to let us live together - on the eve of the Partition. The policy of keeping us divided was always followed by foreigners, even after the Partition. If Indians and Pakistanis had been together...I don't say as confederated countries but as neighboring and friendly countries...like Italy and France, for example ...believe me, both of us would have progressed much further.”

“I discovered [Joan of Arc] toward the age of ten or twelve, when I went to France. I don't remember where I read about her, but I recall that she immediately took on a definite importance for me. I wanted to sacrifice my life for my country. It seems like foolishness and yet...what happens when we're children is engraved forever on our lives.”

“WikiLeaks does not publish from the jurisdiction of Ecuador, from this embassy or in the territory of Ecuador; we publish from France, we publish from, from Germany, we publish from The Netherlands and from a number of other countries, so that the attempted squeeze on WikiLeaks is through my refugee status; and this is, this is really intolerable. [It means] that [they] are trying to get at a publishing organisation; [they] try and prevent it from publishing true information that is of intense interest to the American people and others about an election.”

“During the '80s, those you would call the young philosophers of France, such as Bernard-Henri Lévy and [André ] Gluxman, pointed out that Camus had said things no one wanted to hear in the political arena. They said it was [Albert] Camus who was right, not those who had slid under the influence of Sartre, that is to say an unconditional devotion to Communism as seen in the Soviet Union. And ever since then the evaluation of Camus has continued to modify up until today”

“What is true, and I think that we can't deny it, is that some of the same concerns about globalization, about technology, rapid social change that were reflected in Brexit, that's been reflected in some of the debates in Germany and France and other places, that those exist in the United States as well. My view is that over the long term, over the next 10, 15, 20 years, if we are able to address the legitimate economic concerns of those who feel left behind by globalization, then many of these tensions will be reduced. And we will see a world that is less divided.”

“The five original nuclear weapon states I mentioned - U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia - under the NPT have committed to the achievement of the elimination of their nuclear arsenals through good faith negotiations of nuclear disarmament - that's Article Six of the treaty.”

“The United States says "We're complying. We're following the disarmament obligation. Look at the quantitative reductions that are taking place." But, since '96, there really hasn't been progress on specific commitments that have been made. Perhaps most disturbing is this: that the United States and France in particular, since 1996, have expanded the range of circumstances under which they might use - they say they might use - nuclear weapons.”

“Basically [United States and France] said "We will use nuclear weapons whenever it suits our purposes to do so." So this expansion of doctrines regarding possible use of nuclear weapons makes them more, you know, sort of, salient and important and so it's increasing the perceived political value of nuclear weapons and therefore causing or contributing to possible proliferation.”

“In France now, there's no problem with official censorship. Once your movie is finished, you always are R-rated. My movie is just R-rated in France. But when you meet French producers with a script like mine, they behave like the most fragile chickens in the world. They just tell you "Oh, no. You should cut this. You should cut that." And at the end you have been totally censored on the synopsis, and then on the script.”