“Intelligence can only mature in an atmosphere of joy.”

Simone Weil (1909-1943)
Philosopher

“I’ll speak about Simon Weil, whom I welcomed under my roof, and with whom I worked the earth and broke bread, just ten years ago – before she became what horrified her the most : a historical figure. (…) I don’t want to speak of her physical appearance (she wasn’t ugly, like they say, but prematurely stooped and aged by asceticism and sickness, and her admirable eyes were the only part of her that stayed afloat in the shipwreck of her beauty), nor do I want to speak of her unbelievable attire and baggage (she was royally ignorant not only of the canons of elegance, but even of the elementary usages which allow one to go unnoticed); I will just say that my initial contact with her awoke in me certain sentiments that were very different from aversion, but even so just as difficult. I had the impression that I had a being before me that was radically foreign to all my ways of feeling and of thinking, to everything that represented the sense and the sweetness of life for me. In a word, she was the revelation of my own antipode. (…) My only positive impression was a feeling, despite all our intellectual and affective differences, of unconditional respect for the being in whom I obscurely guessed the presence of a unique greatness. This sentiment of veneration grew even greater when having left her for a few moments to receive a visitor I returned to find her in front of the house, seated on a trunk lost in contemplation of the Rhône valley. Her regard emerged little by little from her vision to return to reality; the intensity, the purity of her regard was such that you could sense that she was contemplating the interior depths at the same time as the splendid horizon which lay open below her, and that the beauty of her soul corresponded with the tender majesty of the view.”

Gustave Thibon (1903-2001)
Philosopher