“Heritage is a vector of serene identity”

The general public knows him as a heritage lover. Suffice it to say, therefore, that the National Book Center was not mistaken in choosing Stéphane Bern as the sponsor of the 9th edition of its cultural event, from January 23 to 26, 2025.

LE FIGARO. – In your opinion, is literature part of heritage?

Stéphane BERN . –Absolutely! As such, the works of Molière, Montaigne, Chateaubriand, Christine de Pisan, Françoise Sagan, Marguerite Yourcenar, Simone de Beauvoir and Victor Hugo are monuments of French culture. Don't we also say that Research by Marcel Proust is a paper cathedral? Like built heritage and natural heritage, these monuments of the French language are vectors of history and identity. By appropriating these texts from our literature, we integrate through culture.

Heritage inherently carries this notion of inheritance, and therefore, of transmission. What books have you been given?

I was lucky enough to be born and grow up among books – my parents always refused to let television distract our attention from the library – and that's how, very young, I was able to live a thousand lives thanks to literature. The family library that I inherited is a mainly classical monument with contemporary additions made up of hundreds of books considered essential, to which new novels have brought a touch of modernity. My parents had eclectic tastes but I was happy that they passed on to me books that I had not been interested in, like the theatrical works of Sacha Guitry, all of Gide, Mauriac, Sartre, Beauvoir, Sagan, Robert Sabatier , Robert Merle, Jean d'Ormesson… In addition to my favorite monuments which are Flaubert, Balzac, Chateaubriand, Racine and Corneille!

Heritage, ancient or from the 20th century, religious, vernacular, astral or industrial represents this anchor that we need, to connect us to History

Stéphane Bern

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We can say that you were born into heritage, since you were born in Lyon, capital of Gaul, capital of gastronomy, cradle of cinema… Was your passion for heritage born there?

My passion for heritage was largely built in my hometown of Lyon where I returned to study, walking the traboules, rolling down the hills of Fourvière or Croix-Rousse, but to be completely honest, it is born in Nancy where I lived from 4 to 8 years old. We lived in a soulless or interesting building from the 1960s but, at the end of the street, I was amazed by Place Stanislas, Place de la Carrière, and the Lorraine Museum. It was an aesthetic and emotional shock that never left me when we arrived in Paris. Every week, my parents took us to visit a museum or heritage monument. This forged my passion.

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We saw the ties that united the French to Notre-Dame de Paris, when it burned on April 15, 2019, but also and especially during its reopening, last December. What does this passion around this symbol of heritage inspire you? In your opinion, are the French, and more generally, attached to their heritage?

Beyond the beliefs and convictions of each person, the enthusiasm of the French for the reopening of Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral, massively followed live on television, can be explained as much by the emotion that five years had aroused before the terrible fire of this religious and cultural place which represents the book of History of France and the theater of great national events, only by this very French passion for historical heritage. It is a vector of serene identity, of anchoring in History and it is a sanctuary of beauty and art even in the most remote villages of our mountains. Heritage, old or 20th century^e century, religious, vernacular, astral or industrial represents this anchor that we need to connect us to History.

Heritage is intangible with literature. But during Reading Nights, the public will be able to link reading and architecture. Is this also why you agreed to become a sponsor of the event?

This is indeed my main concern, I would even say my obsession: to transmit the love of beauty, of art, of architecture and the taste for heritage. What I liked about the theme chosen this year by the CNL for these Nights of Reading is the plural notion of heritage. You know that I am too often associated with the castle and religious heritage, whereas the Bern Mission for heritage in danger has greatly helped the vernacular, working and industrial heritage, the heritage of the 20th^e century often neglected, without forgetting these famous houses including the houses of writers. I am thinking of Jean Giono's house, “le Paraïs” in Manosque, Colette's house in Saint-Sauveur-en-Puisaye or even the entire restoration of Aunt Léonie's house dear to Marcel Proust in Illiers-Combray, the one of the rare villages in France which adopted the name that the author immortalized in literature. Quite a symbol!