Welcome listeners to the First Things podcast from the editor's desk.

I'm Rusty Reno, editor of First Things, and I'm joined today by Nathan Kinkowski,

and we're going to talk about France's most controversial man, Eric Seymour. Nathan, you wrote this piece in summer of 2021, suggesting

that Seymour at a media personality was perhaps poised to run with top office in France.

And now we know as of yesterday or the day before yesterday that indeed he has thrown his hat into the ring.

Yes, indeed.

So thanks for having me on the show. I'm glad to discuss this.

So this is not without historical precedent for a literary man for intellectual to go into politics.

Victor Hugo, La Martine would be two 19th century examples. The question is, I think, can one pull this off in the 21st century?

Indeed.

Let's talk then about his profile, so to speak.

One thing that struck me in your piece is that he sort of made a name for himself, I think

this would be fair to say, he made the name for himself as a vociferous opponent of 1968,

which is in the French political and social imagination the great watershed year.

To talk about the 60-8ers is to speak of the baby boom generation that finally for the first time

brought France to truly honor her founding principles, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Yeah, so this is exactly it.

And he sort of summarizes their project as an exercise in deconstruction, derision, and destruction.

And what's really clear about it and what really made him, I think, one of the

prominent figures, is just that he pulled no punches in dealing with what that generation did

and the way they dramatically transformed the French landscape and and transform the nature of

the Republican regime. I think that's a key theme in Zemont's a campaign. What does it take to get us

...