Read Alain
I jotted this down as a reminder on my to‑do list:
“Read Alain – you must read Alain.”
The philosopher, the teacher, the brave and insightful man, the author of Propos sur les pouvoirs.
Émile Chartier, known as Alain, born in 1868, died in 1951.
Why do I believe it's so important to read Alain’s work?
Because Alain succeeded in creating a distinctive literary form — the Propos — which draws upon a rich French tradition while renewing it with strength, conviction, and generosity.
What exactly is a Propos ?
”It’s a short column, drafted on two pages of letter paper, and, at the beginning, published in a local newspaper. From 1906 Alain wrote them daily and only ceased with the outbreak of war in 1914; he began again in 1921 and continued to 1936, to make a total of around five thousand” : https://philosophe-alain.fr/alain-in-english/
Reading these brief yet dense texts is a way of regaining intellectual vitality — almost in the physical sense of the term. Why? Because understanding the mechanisms and structures of power allows you to take a step back, to detach yourself from the immediacy of the moment, and to rise above it all, if only for a while.
Reading Alain’s Propos is to encounter a style — a way of lively and witty writing, nourished by anecdotes and the art of the exemplum: that little piece of fiction inserted into the flow of reflection, making the idea real, embodied, and thought-provoking.
Reading Alain feels, for me, a bit like rediscovering the unique charm of Montaigne’s Essays — that blend of thought, reflection, and stories, whether real, fictional, or somewhere in between.
Alain resonates with me especially now, as I search — not yet successfully — for a form, a way of writing or speaking that truly invites people to think.
I can see the tricks often used in popular media — let’s be honest, the things that generate thousands or millions of views on YouTube. But they often make me uneasy. It feels like the audience is being taken for fools: easily manipulated as long as they’re drawn in with artificial involvement and appeals to their reptilian brain — fear, emotion, impulse.
What I dream of is a different way of engaging an audience. One that might help us go further, be smarter, more perceptive, and, ultimately, more human — together. A way that resists the slogans of the day, the hollow correctness that pretends to be everywhere and for everyone.
Is that utopian? Yes, maybe. But isn’t utopia precisely that horizon that drives us to give and share the best of ourselves?
Right now, I’m reading Propos sur les pouvoirs, and it’s such a powerful and relevant book that I sometimes have to put it down. The clarity with which Alain exposes certain truths feels almost too harsh. I wish it weren’t true — even though I’ve witnessed it myself, sometimes in very concrete ways, across different contexts and scales. But Alain shows us how to move beyond emotional reaction — not by rejecting it, but by recognizing it as a kind of primary heart-impulse, which can be integrated into a practice of awareness and transmission.
There’s a sense of thought in motion here, and I’m realizing that this is the hallmark of truly interesting, vital thinking — something alive, something that brushes up against the Tao I mentioned to you a while ago (see François Cheng, Cyrille Javary).
His thinking is flexible, alive, formed through contact with the world: news, experiences, observations, conversations — a genuine attentiveness to what surrounds and informs him.
It doesn’t look down on anything. On the contrary, it gives attention. It sees.
What I love is that he’s not trying to write a definitive book — something people would later call “essential reading.” Instead, it’s his Propos themselves, with their tone and variety, that gradually shape a whole — a figure who walks, thinks, and gives. That’s how you hear a voice. And that voice speaks to me deeply.
“Je suis né simple soldat. […] Ce que j’écris ici n’est donc point pour me plaindre de mon sort, mais plutôt pour rendre compte de mes opinions à ceux qui s’en étonnent et même s’en attristent ; cela vient de ce qu’ils sont nés officiers. Non point sots ; ils n’y a point tant de sots ; mais plutôt persuadés qu’il y a des hommes qui sont nés pour commander, et qu’ils sont de ceux-là. Et c’est ce que je reconnais de fort loin à un certain air de suffisance et de sécurité, comme s’ils étaient précédés d’une police invisible qui éloigne la canaille. J’en vois de tous métiers, les uns officiers dans le sens propre, d’autres, épiciers, d’autres, curés, d’autres, professeurs, […]. Ils ont ceci de commun qu’ils sont assurés qu’un blâme de leur part ou seulement un avertissement me feront abandonner aussitôt mes opinions de simple soldat ; espérance toujours trompée”.
Un peu plus loin, encore : “me voilà donc […] toujours mal pensant ; […] retournant ainsi, noire ingratitude, la rhétorique contre ceux qui me l’ont apprise”.
And since chance often does things well, I can’t help but point out that this foreword, placed at the beginning of Propos sur les pouvoirs, was written in June — June 10th, 1922.
So, 103 years later, I want to sincerely thank the philosopher, thinker, and writer for these words that help free us from many of the world’s wounds — mots and maux, words and woes, almost feel like a pun in French.
These words give me the courage to keep writing… what’s still to come.
I’d also like to take this opportunity to express my deep gratitude to my former philosophy teacher in classes préparatoires, Patrick Dupouey, who introduced us to Alain’s work: https://www.calameo.com/accounts/6087604.
Years later (25 already — wow! A fine number, and it does feel like an anniversary), dear Mr. Dupouey, I continue to read Alain with an understanding shaped and deepened by life itself.
So yes — Read Alain :)
June, 16th, 2025.
Though Alain held a prominent place in French intellectual life during the 1930s, his presence in the Anglophone world remains minimal, with only scarce translations available. Below are two insightful articles discussing Alain’s thought and its limited yet meaningful reception among Anglophone readers.