Quotes About French

I feel very close to French culture and to the French humanism, which occasionally one finds, even in the highest places. And therefore, all of my books have been written in French.

The French are not rude. They just happen to hate you. But that is no reason to bypass this beautiful country, whose master chefs have a well-deserved worldwide reputation for trying to trick people into eating snails. Nobody is sure how this got started. Probably a couple of French master chefs were standing around one day, and they found a snail, and one of them said: 'I bet that if we called this something like `escargot,' tourists would eat it.' Then they had hearty laugh, because 'escargot' is the French word for 'fat crawling bag of phlegm.'

American women often fall into the trap of, "Oh, these are my weekend clothes. These are my work clothes. This is what I wear at night." It's so old-fashioned. The French are not afraid of their luxury. Americans can be so puritanical and think, "That's my special-occasion bag." Whereas, for a French woman, it's her everyday bag.

Patrick Demarchelier was the one who got me my first Vogue cover. It was French Vogue - I think in ’87 or ’88. I think I was the first black model to be on the cover of French Vogue, which was shocking to me because when I asked them about it, they were like, "Oh, no. We’ve never had that before."

French rhetorical models are too narrow for the English tradition. Most pernicious of French imports is the notion that there is no person behind a text. Is there anything more affected, aggressive, and relentlessly concrete than a Parisan intellectual behind his/her turgid text? The Parisian is a provincial when he pretends to speak for the universe.

The real reason French women don't get fat is not genetic, but cultural, and if the French subjected themselves to the American extremes of eating and dieting, the obesity problem in France would be much worse than what has struck America.

In France you cannot not have lunch. If you stopped the French from having lunch, you will have a second revolution, I can tell you this. Not going to work - it is part of the French privilege.

I started to write because of my dream to become a filmmaker. I got to know about a film school in Paris and it was my goal to get there. To do that I knew I had to learn French. In order to practice I started to write journals in French. The effort I made to master what I regarded a bad thing - a language owned by the rich Moroccans - brought me the ability to write.

I became a pedant of the form. I did my graduate work in art history and particularly in the history of French satirical cartooning. And that made me aware of what a rich and resilient tradition this seemingly scabrous sacrilegious magazine still represented in French life.

There is no word in English for chic. Why should there be? Everything chic is by legend French. Perhaps everything chic is in reality French.

That amenity which the French have developed into a great art . . . conversation.

I went to a French school, so we didn't study Bram Stoker there. I just thought it was a genius thing.

Mick Jagger could French-kiss a moose. He has child-bearing lips.

One of the richest and largest markets in the world, Europe can set global standards. And if a French president is prepared to at least consider clear rules in the Eurozone, then it would be fatal if Germany were not to react.

I'm always feeling like I don't belong, no matter where I am. So I'm just searching for a family nonstop, and sometimes I find it in the mosh pit, sometimes I find it when I'm doing some French TV show with the president's wife.

Nothing is as depressing as absolute logic. Look at the maze of French politics perpetrated by a logical people.

Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French.

I have had some problems because the French don't like people to have success, they don't like the number one.

I like to be in a huis clos, as the French say - in one place. It's something that in general can create a bit of claustrophobia. But for me, claustrophobia becomes almost immediately claustrophilia. I love it!

I speak French with timidity, and not flowingly--except when excited. When using that language I have often noticed that I have hardly ever been mistaken for a Frenchman, except, perhaps, by horses; never, I believe, by people.

Just speak very loudly and quickly, and state your position with utter conviction, as the French do, and you'll have a marvelous time!

London is one of the few cities where people still dress properly and fashion exists. Every day I see women who've thought about their outfits. They've picked out the bag, put on proper shoes. ... Do you know how rare it is in parts of America to actually see 'an outfit'? France? I don't want to be anti-French but there isn't a more unattractive group of people on the streets.

18th century scientists, the French in particular, seldom did things simply if an absurdly demanding alternative was available.

Why would we expect the French to fight to liberate the Iraqis when they wouldn't fight to liberate themselves?

Oh some are fond of Spanish wine, and some are fond of French.

The German-French friendship is indispensable for Europe. And I will never let myself be carried away to making statements that would change it.

Do you realize that in the past sixty years, the only foreigners the French have been able to drive out are American tourists?

There was another war-related casualty today. The French were injured when they tried to jump on our bandwagon.

I don’t like water. I drink Diet Coke. Nor do I smoke, or drink alcohol or even sip a café. I don’t look after myself. I don’t do yoga, Pilates, those things. I hate physical effort, I don’t run anywhere, but I am super-energetic. Make-up? I just black my eyes and that’s it. My hair? I get it cut on set (fashion shoots), I never go to a hairdresser. I’m not sure I’m French. You think I’m not smart enough?

You have to list all your special skills on a form when you get an agent. There's fencing, stage combat, horse riding, motorbike riding, Spanish, French, German, whatever. I just ticked everything. I talk about 10 languages according to that form. I even ticked the extreme sports box.

John XXI was a very great pope and he's the one who actually corrected the liturgy. He did so because of his friend Jules Isaac, a French Jewish historian who was a friend of John Paul, of John 23rd, and he convinced him and he changed the liturgy, no more Jew, the perfidious Jew and so forth and now, and don't speak any more of the Jews killing Christ. Things have changed.

French parents are very concerned about their kids. They know about pedophiles, allergies, and choking hazards. They take reasonable precautions. But they aren't panicked about their children's well-being. This calmer outlook makes them better at both establishing boundaries and giving their kids some autonomy.

I like food too much to go on some crazy diet. French fries are my favorite downfall.

When I moved to Paris in the '70s, there wasn't very much going on in film in England. So when I started doing French films, there was a natural movement toward the kind of films I wanted to do. It wasn't the reason I came, but it so happened that I stepped into a time and place that actually corresponded to what I wanted. That sometimes happens in life. And it was rather beautiful.

Whether it's destiny or fate or whatever, I don't think I could do a French Laundry anywhere else.

Did they find something wanting in you, Gemma, at the party? You didn’t speak too freely or behave…strangely?” I grew claws and bayed at the moon. I confessed that I eat the hearts of small children. I told them I like the French.

We French-Canadians belong to one country, Canada: Canada is for us the whole world: but the English-Canadians have two countries, one here and one across the sea.

I had art as a major, along with English, French and History. I had dance, modern dance. In English I was allowed to write my own poetry, which I eventually got published.

Americans are just beginning to regard food the way the French always have. Dinner is not what you do in the evening before something else. Dinner is the evening.

Having wallowed in a delightful orgy of anti-French sentiment, having deplored and applauded the villains themselves, having relished the foibles of bankers, railwaymen, diplomats, and police, the public was now ready to see its faith restored in the basic soundness of banks, railroads, government, and police.

The odour of Burgundy, and the smell of French sauces, and the sight of clean napkins and long loaves, knocked as a very welcome visitor at the door of our inner man.

I'm fascinated by the new iPhone. I bought it and kept trying to use it in France. "Siri, what is a good restaurant?" (In a robotic voice.) "I'm sorry, Robin. I can't give locations in France." "Why, Siri?" "I don't know." It's like she was upset with the French or something. "They seem to have an attitude I can't understand. Should I look for Germans, Robin?"

I perfectly understood President Obama's attitude throughout the French presidential campaign. He had no reason to distance himself from Nicolas Sarkozy. It's the basic solidarity that leaders who worked together owe to each other.

Politically, [Albert Camus] was in favour of a federation, and effectively he considered that like South Africa today (or as they are trying to do), there should be a mixed population with equal rights, the same rights for the Arab and the French populations, as well as all the other races living there.

Instagram - it's fun, but Facebook, no, just here and there. I use Instagram as a kick, like when somebody tells me to check out so-and-so's Instagram account to check out their French toast or a trip to Tanzania. But I don't have an account.

I never wanted to work in fashion. At age 12 or 13, I wanted to design for showgirls - for the theater! And I was crazy for the Hollywood of the 1950s: Dietrich, Elizabeth Taylor, Jennifer Jones. They were my idea of glamour - and Sylvie Vartan, the French singer.

French, for example, is declining as an international language, but Spanish, Mandarin and Arabic are all languages of the future. Ethnic minority groups in the UK may well prove to be a major asset in this effort.

Just as the French of the nineteenth century invested their surplus capital in a railway-system in the belief that they would makemoney by it in this life, in the thirteenth they trusted their money to the Queen of Heaven because of their belief in her power to repay it with interest in the life to come.