Weil is the name of the following German towns:

• Weil, Bavaria
• Weil am Rhein, Baden-Württemberg
• Weil der Stadt, Baden-Württemberg
• Weil im Schönbuch, Baden-Württemberg

Weil may also refer to:

• Weil (surname), including people with the surname Weill, Weyl
• Doctor Weil (Mega Man Zero), a fictional character from the Mega Man Zero video game series
• Weil (river), Germany (near Weilburg)
• Weil-Marbach, now the Marbach stud in Baden-Wurttenburg

See also[link]

• Weill (disambiguation)
• Weil, Gotshal & Manges, law firm founded in the United States
• Weil's disease

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Simone Weil (French pronunciation: [simɔn vɛj]; 3 February 1909 in Paris, France – 24 August 1943 in Ashford, Kent, England) was a French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist.

Weil's whole life was marked by an exceptional compassion for the suffering of others; at the age of five, she refused to eat sugar after she heard that soldiers fighting WWI had to go without. She died from malnutrition during WWII after refusing to eat more than the minimal rations she believed were available to soldiers at the time. After completing her education Weil became a professor. She taught intermittently throughout the 1930s - she took several breaks due to poor health and to devote herself to political activism. Weil was politically active from early childhood: her activism included helping unions to organise and work together collaboratively, involvement with Marxists and Anarchists, fighting in the Spanish Civil War, and spending more than a year working as a labourer so she could better understand the working class. She sometimes gave away almost her entire income and lived in the most frugal of circumstances, though she did occasionally allow herself foreign holidays.

Unusually among twentieth century left-leaning intellectuals, she became more religious and inclined towards mysticism as her life progressed. Weil wrote throughout her life, though most of her writings did not attract much attention until after her death. She was later to become the subject of extensive scholarship across a wide range of fields: ^[1] a meta study from the University of Calgary found that between 1995 and 2012, over 2500 new scholarly works had been published about her. ^[2] While sometimes described as odd, humourless and irritating, she inspired great affection in many of those who knew her. Albert Camus described her as "the only great spirit of our times". ^[3]

Biography[link]

Weil was born in Paris to Alsatian agnostic Jewish parents who fled the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine to Germany. She grew up in comfortable circumstances; her father was a doctor. Her only sibling was André Weil, who would go on to become a great mathematician of the 20th century. She suffered throughout her life from severe headaches, sinusitis, and poor physical coordination, and spared no scrutiny to these in her philosophical writings. Her brilliance, ascetic lifestyle, introversion, and eccentricity limited her ability to mix with others, but not to teach and participate in political movements of her time. She wrote extensively with both insight and breadth about political movements of which she was a part and later about spiritual mysticism. Weil biographer Gabriella Fiori writes that Weil was "a moral genius in the orbit of ethics, a genius of immense revolutionary range."^[4] In 1951 Albert Camus wrote that she was "the only great spirit of our times." ^[3]

Intellectual life[link]

Weil was a precocious student, proficient in Ancient Greek by the age of 12. She later learned Sanskrit after reading the Bhagavad Gita. Like the Renaissance thinker, Pico della Mirandola, her interests in other religions were universalist, and she attempted to understand each religious tradition as expressive of transcendent wisdom.

In her teens she studied at the Lycée Henri IV under the tutelage of her admired teacher Émile Chartier, more commonly known as "Alain".^[5] In 1928, Weil finished first in the entrance examination for the École Normale Supérieure; Simone de Beauvoir, her more long-lived and famous peer, finished second.^[6] During these years Weil attracted much attention with her radical opinions. She was called the "Red virgin",^[7] and even "The Martian" by her admired mentor.^[8]

At the École Normale Supérieure she studied philosophy, receiving her Agrégation diploma in 1931.^[9] Weil taught philosophy at a secondary school for girls in Le Puy and teaching was her primary employment during her short life.

Weil's most famous works were published posthumously.

Political activism[link]

Weil often became involved in political action out of sympathy with the working class. In 1915, when she was only six years old, she refused sugar in solidarity with the troops entrenched along the Western Front. In 1919, at 10 years of age, she declared herself a Bolshevik. In her late teens, she became involved in the workers' movement. She wrote political tracts, marched in demonstrations, and advocated workers' rights. At this time, she was a Marxist, pacifist, and trade unionist. While teaching in Le Puy, she became involved in local political activity, supporting the unemployed and striking workers despite criticism by some. She also wrote about social and economic issues, including Oppression and Liberty and numerous short articles for trade union journals. This work criticised popular Marxist thought, and gave a pessimistic account of the limits of both capitalism and socialism.

She participated in the French general strike of 1933, called to protest against unemployment and wage cuts. The following year she took a 12-month leave of absence from her teaching position to work incognito as a labourer in two factories, one owned by Renault, believing that this experience would allow her to connect with the working class. Her poor health and inadequate physical strength forced her to quit after some months. In 1935 she resumed teaching, and donated most of her income to political causes and charitable endeavours.

In 1936, despite her professed pacifism, she fought in the Spanish Civil War on the Republican side. She identified herself as an anarchist^[10] and joined the Sébastien Faure Century, the French-speaking section of the anarchist militia. However, her clumsiness repeatedly put her comrades at risk. After burning herself over a cooking fire, she left Spain to recuperate in Assisi. She continued to write essays on labour and management, and war and peace.

Encounter with mysticism[link]

The Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli in Assisi where Simone had one of three spiritual "encounters that really counted," leading to her conversion to Christianity.^[11]

Weil was born into a secular household and raised in "complete agnosticism".^[12][13] As a teenager she considered the existence of God for herself and decided nothing could be known either way. In her Spiritual Autobiography however Weil records that she always had a Christian outlook, taking to heart the idea of loving one's neighbour from her earliest childhood. Weil became attracted to the Christian faith from 1935, the first of three pivotal experiences for her being when she was moved by the beauty of villagers singing hymns during an outdoor service that she stumbled across during a holiday to Portugal.^[14][15]

While in Assisi in the spring of 1937, she experienced a religious ecstasy in the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli—the same church in which Saint Francis of Assisi had prayed. She was led to pray for the first time in her life as Cunningham (2004: p. 118) relates:

Below the town is the beautiful church and convent of San Damiano where Saint Clare once lived. Near that spot is the place purported to be where Saint Francis composed the larger part of his "Canticle of Brother Sun." Below the town in the valley is the ugliest church in the entire environs: the massive baroque basilica of Saint Mary of the Angels, finished in the seventeenth century and rebuilt in the nineteenth century, which houses a rare treasure: a tiny Romanesque chapel that stood in the days of Saint Francis—the "Little Portion" where he would gather his brethren. It was in that tiny chapel that the great mystic Simone Weil first felt compelled to kneel down and pray.^[16]

She had another, more powerful, revelation a year later while reciting George Herbert's poem Love III, after which "Christ himself came down and took possession of me"^[17] and, from 1938 on, her writings became more mystical and spiritual, while retaining their focus on social and political issues. She was attracted to Roman Catholicism, but declined to be baptized; preferring to remain outside due to "the love of those things that are outside Christianity".^[18][19][20] During World War II, she lived for a time in Marseille, receiving spiritual direction from a Dominican friar. Around this time she met the French Catholic author Gustave Thibon, who later edited some of her work.

Weil did not limit her curiosity to Christianity. She was keenly interested in other religious traditions—especially the Greek and Egyptian mysteries, Hinduism (especially the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita), and Mahayana Buddhism. She believed that all these and other traditions contained elements of genuine revelation,^[21] writing that:

Greece, Egypt, ancient India, the beauty of the world, the pure and authentic reflection of this beauty in art and science..these things have done as much as the visibly Christian ones to deliver me into Christ's hands as his captive. I think I might even say more.^[22]

She was, nevertheless, opposed to religious syncretism, claiming that it effaced the particularity of the individual traditions:

Each religion is alone true, that is to say, that at the moment we are thinking of it we must bring as much attention to bear on it as if there were nothing else ... A "synthesis" of religion implies a lower quality of attention.^[23]

Last years[link]

In 1942, she travelled to the United States with her family. Weil lived briefly in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. She is remembered to have attended daily Mass at Corpus Christi Church there, where the Columbia student and future Trappist monk Thomas Merton was later to be received into the Roman Catholic Church. Long believed not to have sought baptism, there is now evidence, including a claim from a priest who knew her, that she was baptized shortly before her death. After New York, she went to London, where she joined the French Resistance. The punishing work regime she assumed soon took a heavy toll; in 1943 she was diagnosed with tuberculosis and instructed to rest and eat well. However, she refused special treatment because of her long-standing political idealism and activism and her detachment from material things. Instead, she limited her food intake to what she believed residents of the parts of France occupied by the Germans ate. She most likely ate even less, as she refused food on most occasions.^{[citation needed]} Her condition quickly deteriorated, and she was moved to a sanatorium in Ashford, Kent, England.

After a lifetime of battling illness and frailty, Weil died in August 1943 from cardiac failure at the age of 34. The coroner's report said that "the deceased did kill and slay herself by refusing to eat whilst the balance of her mind was disturbed."^[24]

To this day, the cause of her death remains a subject of debate for many. Some claim that her refusal to eat came from her desire to express some form of solidarity toward the victims of the war. Others think that Weil's self-starvation occurred after her study of Schopenhauer^[25] (in his chapters on Christian saintly asceticism and salvation, he had described self-starvation as a preferred method of self-denial). However, Simone Pétrement,^[26] one of Weil's first and most significant biographers, considers that the coroner's report was simply mistaken. Basing herself on letters written by the personnel of the sanatorium at which Simone Weil was treated, Pétrement affirms that Weil asked for food on different occasions while she was hospitalized and even ate a little bit a few days before her death; according to her, it is in fact Weil's poor health condition that eventually made her unable to eat.

Weil's first English biographer, Richard Rees offers several possible explanations for her death, citing her compassion for the suffering of her countrymen in occupied France and her love for and close imitation of Christ. Rees sums up by saying: "As for her death, whatever explanation one may give of it will amount in the end to saying that she died of love."^[27]

Philosophy[link]

This article is written like a personal reflection or essay rather than an encyclopedic description of the subject. Please help improve it by rewriting it in an encyclopedic style. (December 2007)

This section may contain original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding references. Statements consisting only of original research may be removed. More details may be available on the talk page. (September 2007)

Weil's philosophy contained elements of both spirituality and politics; she had both an intensely personal spiritual drive, and a social philosophy that emphasized the relationships between individuals and groups. This intersection of thought developed in her an interest in healing social rifts of the proletariat and providing for the physical and psychological needs of humanity.

[edit] Lectures on Philosophy

Lectures on Philosophy is a compilation of the lectures that Weil composed for her lycée students. Focussing on the materialist philosophical project, she deals with truth not logically or scientifically but psychologically or phenomenologically. Here she discusses the conditions necessary for an experience of truth to emerge for the human subject, or for an object or concept to emerge as real within human experience.^{[citation needed]}

However, she does not advocate a general theory of human "truth-production", justified by empirical observation.^[28] As distinguished from the writings of William James, the Lectures describe the problem of truth as deeply personal, to be approached through introspection. Weil combines her background with idealist philosophy with an appreciation of the limits of foundationalism and produced writings such as the following:

Any proof of the syllogism would be absurd. The syllogism is, to put it briefly, nothing but a rule of language to avoid contradiction: at bottom the principle of non-contradiction is a principle of grammar.

— Simone Weil , LP, p. 78

and

We are forced to accept the postulates and axioms precisely because we are unable to give an account of them. What one can do is try to explain why they seem obvious to us.

— Simone Weil ,^{[verification needed]}

and

One can never really give a proof of the reality of anything; reality is not something open to proof, it is something established. It is established just because proof is not enough. It is this characteristic of language, at once indispensable and inadequate, which shows the reality of the external world. Most people hardly ever realize this, because it is rare that the very same man thinks and puts his thought into action ...

— Simone Weil , LP, p. 72–3

The Lectures go on to explore further the disjunction between planning and execution, which is brought about by the division of labor between designer (e.g., architect) and worker (e.g., bricklayer)—a division that leads to many societal difficulties and draws on Weil's encounters with the philosophy of Marx.^{[original research?]}

Putting thought into action is further described in this way:

What marks off the "self" is method; it has no other source than ourselves: it is when we really employ method that we really begin to exist. As long as one employs method only on symbols one remains within the limits of a sort of game. In action that has method about it, we ourselves act, since it is we ourselves who found the method; we really act because what is unforeseen presents itself to us.

—Simone Weil , ibid.

For Weil, both self and world are constituted only through informed action upon the world.

Theology[link]

[edit] Mysticism in Gravity and Grace

While Gravity and Grace is one of the books most associated with Simone Weil, the work was not one she wrote to be published as a book. Rather, the work consists of various passages selected from Weil's notebooks and arranged topically by Gustave Thibon, who knew and befriended her. Weil had in fact given some of her notebooks, written before May 1942, to Thibon, but not with any idea or request to publish them. Hence, the resulting work, in its selections, organization and editing, is much influenced by Mr. Thibon, a devoted Catholic. (See Thibon's Introduction to Gravity and Grace (Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1952))

T. S. Eliot's preface to The Need for Roots suggests that Simone Weil might be regarded as a modern-day Marcionite,^[29] due to her virtually wholesale rejection of the Old Testament and her overall distaste for the Judaism that was technically hers by birth;^[who?] others have identified her as a gnostic for similar reasons, as well as for her mystical theologization of geometry and Platonist philosophy.^[who?] However, it has been pointed out^[who?] that this analysis falls apart when it comes to the creation of the world, for Weil does not regard the world as a debased creation of a demiurge, but as a direct expression of God's love—despite the fact that she also recognizes it as a place of evil, affliction, and the brutal mixture of chance and necessity. This juxtaposition leads her to produce an unusual form of Christian theodicy.

It is difficult to speak conclusively of Weil's theology, since it exists only in the form of scattered aphorisms in her notebooks, and in a handful of letters. Neither of these formats provides a very direct path to understanding or evaluating her beliefs, nevertheless, it is possible to make certain generalizations.^{[original research?]}

Absence[link]

Absence is the key image for her metaphysics, cosmology, cosmogeny, and theodicy. She believed that God created by an act of self-delimitation—in other words, because God is conceived as a kind of utter fullness, a perfect being, no creature could exist except where God was not. Thus creation occurred only when God withdrew in part.

This is, for Weil, an original kenosis (emptiness) preceding the corrective kenosis of Christ's incarnation (cf. Athanasius). We are thus born in a sort of damned position not owing to original sin as such, but because to be created at all we had to be precisely what God is not, i.e., we had to be the opposite of what is holy.

This notion of creation is a cornerstone of her theodicy, for if creation is conceived this way (as necessarily containing evil within itself), then there is no problem of the entrance of evil into a perfect world. Nor does this constitute a delimitation of God's omnipotence, if it is not that God could not create a perfect world, but that the act which we refer towards by saying "create" in its very essence implies the impossibility of perfection.

However, this notion of the necessity of evil does not mean that we are simply, originally, and continually doomed; on the contrary, Weil tells us that "Evil is the form which God's mercy takes in this world."^[30] Weil believed that evil, and its consequence, affliction, served the role of driving us out of ourselves and towards God—"The extreme affliction which overtakes human beings does not create human misery, it merely reveals it."^[31]

More specifically, affliction drives us to what Weil referred to as "decreation"—which is not death, but rather closer to "extinction" (nirvana) in the Buddhist tradition—the willed dissolution of the subjective ego in attaining realization of the true nature of the universe.^{[verification needed]}

Affliction[link]

Weil's concept of affliction ("malheur") goes beyond simple suffering, though it certainly includes it. Only some souls are capable of truly experiencing affliction; these are precisely those souls which are least deserving of it—that are most prone or open to spiritual realization. Affliction is a sort of suffering plus, which transcends both body and mind; such physical and mental anguish scourges the very soul.

War and oppression were the most intense cases of affliction within her reach; to experience it she turned to the life of a factory worker, while to understand it she turned to Homer's Iliad. (Her essay The Iliad or the Poem of Force, first translated by Mary McCarthy, is a piece of Homeric literary criticism.) Affliction was associated both with necessity and with chance—it was fraught with necessity because it was hard-wired into existence itself, and thus imposed itself upon the sufferer with the full force of the inescapable, but it was also subject to chance inasmuch as chance, too, is an inescapable part of the nature of existence. The element of chance was essential to the unjust character of affliction; in other words, my affliction should not usually—let alone always—follow from my sin, as per traditional Christian theodicy, but should be visited upon me for no special reason.

The man who has known pure joy, if only for a moment ... is the only man for whom affliction is something devastating. At the same time he is the only man who has not deserved the punishment. But, after all, for him it is no punishment; it is God holding his hand and pressing rather hard. For, if he remains constant, what he will discover buried deep under the sound of his own lamentations is the pearl of the silence of God.

— Simone Weil , Gravity and Grace

Metaxu: "Every separation is a link"[link]

The concept of metaxy, which Weil borrowed from Plato, is that which both separates and connects (e.g., as a wall separates two prisoners but can be used to tap messages). This idea of connecting distance was of the first importance for Weil's understanding of the created realm. The world as a whole, along with any of its components, including our physical bodies, are to be regarded as serving the same function for us in relation to God that a blind man's stick serves for him in relation to the world about him. They do not afford direct insight, but can be used experimentally to bring the mind into practical contact with reality. This metaphor allows any absence to be interpreted as a presence, and is a further component in Weil's theodicy.

Beauty[link]

For Weil, "The beautiful is the experimental proof that the incarnation is possible." The beauty which is inherent in the form of the world (this inherency is proven, for her, in geometry, and expressed in all good art) is the proof that the world points to something beyond itself; it establishes the essentially telic character of all that exists. Her concept of beauty extends throughout the universe: "... we must have faith that the universe is beautiful on all levels. . . and that it has a fullness of beauty in relation to the bodily and psychic structure of each of the thinking beings that actually do exist and of all those that are possible. It is this very agreement of an infinity of perfect beauties that gives a transcendent character to the beauty of the world. . . He (Christ) is really present in the universal beauty. The love of this beauty proceeds from God dwelling in our souls and goes out to God present in the universe."^[32]

Beauty also served a soteriological function for Weil: "Beauty captivates the flesh in order to obtain permission to pass right to the soul." It constitutes, then, another way in which the divine reality behind the world invades our lives. Where affliction conquers us with brute force, beauty sneaks in and topples the empire of the self from within.

Works[link]

"In the decades since her death, her writings have been assembled, annotated, criticized, discussed, disputed, and praised. Along with some twenty volumes of her works, publishers have issued more than thirty biographies, including Simone Weil: A Modern Pilgrimage by Robert Coles, Harvard's Pulitzer-winning professor, who calls Weil 'a giant of reflection.'"^[33]

[edit] The Need for Roots

Written during World War II, Simone Weil’s book The Need for Roots was written right before her death. She was in London working for the French Resistance and trying to convince the leader of the French Resistance, Charles de Gaulle, to form a contingent of nurses that would serve at the front lines.

The Need for Roots has an ambitious plan. It sets out to address the past and to set out a road map for the future of France after World War II. She painstakingly analyzes the spiritual and ethical milieu that led up to France’s defeat by the German army, and then addresses these issues with the prospect of eventual French victory.

Bibliography[link]

Primary sources[link]

Works in French[link]

• Simone Weil, Œuvres complètes. (Paris: Gallimard, 1989–2006, 6 vols.)
• La Pesanteur et la grâce (1947)
• L'Enracinement (1949)
• Attente de Dieu (1950)
• Lettre à un religieux (1951)
• Les Intuitions pré-chrétiennes (Paris: Les Editions de la Colombe, 1951)
• La Source grecque (Paris: Gallimard, 1952)
• Oppression et liberté (1955)
• Note sur la suppression générale des partis politiques (Paris: Climats, 2006)

Works in English translation[link]

• Formative Writings: 1929–1941. (1987). Dorothy Tuck McFarland & Wilhelmina Van Ness, eds. University of Massachusetts Press.
• The Iliad or the Poem of Force. Pendle Hill Pamphlet. Mary McCarthy trans.
• Intimations of Christianity Among the Greeks. Routledge Kegan Paul, 1957. Elisabeth Chas Geissbuhler trans.
• Letter to a Priest. G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1954.
• The Need for Roots. Routledge Kegan Paul, 1952. Arthur Wills trans., preface by T.S. Eliot
• Gravity and Grace. Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1952. [Routledge Classics 2002.ISBN 0415290015. ISBN 978-0-415-29001-2]
• The Notebooks of Simone Weil (1984) Routledge paperback: ISBN 0-7100-8522-2, 2004 hardcover: ISBN 0-415-32771-7
• On Science, Necessity, & The Love of God. London: Oxford University Press, 1968. Richard Rees trans.
• Oppression and Liberty. Routledge Kegan Paul, 1958.
• Simone Weil's The Iliad or Poem of Force: A Critical Edition. James P. Holoka, ed. & trans. Peter Lang, 2005.
• Simone Weil: An Anthology. Sian Miles, editor. Virago Press, 1986.
• Simone Weil: First and Last Notebooks. London: Oxford University Press, 1970. Richard Rees trans.
• Simone Weil: Lectures on Philosophy. Cambridge University Press, 1959. Intro. by Peter Winch, trans. by Hugh Price.
• The Simone Weil Reader: A Legendary Spiritual Odyssey of Our Time. George A. Panichas, editor. David McKay Co., 1981.
• Simone Weil—Selected Essays: 1934–1943. London: Oxford University Press, 1962. Richard Rees trans.
• Simone Weil: Seventy Letters. London: Oxford University Press, 1965. Richard Rees trans.
• Two Moral Essays by Simone Weil—Draft for a Statement of Human Obligations & Human Personality. Ronald Hathaway, ed. Pendle Hill Pamphlet. Richard Rhees trans.
• Waiting on God. Routledge Kegan Paul, 1951. Emma Craufurd trans.
• Waiting For God. Harper Torchbooks, 1973. Emma Craufurd, trans., with an introduction by Leslie A. Fiedler. ISBN 06-131903-1.

Works in Arabic translation[link]

• Mukhtarat of Simone Weil (Simone Weil, Anthology), Maaber Publisher, Damascus, 2009, translated by Mohamed Ali Abdel Jalil;

• Al Tajazzur (The Need for Roots or L'Enracinement), Maaber Publisher, Damascus, 2010, translated by Mohamed Ali Abdel Jalil;

Secondary sources[link]

• Bell, Richard H. (1998) Simone Weil. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
• -----, editor. (1993) Simone Weil's Philosophy of Culture: Readings Toward a Divine Humanity. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-43263-4
• Davies, Grahame (2007) Everything Must Change. Seren. ISBN 97818541145518
• Dietz, Mary. (1988). Between the Human and the Divine: The Political Thought of Simone Weil.Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
• Doering, E. Jane, ed. (2004) The Christian Platonism Of Simone Weil. University of Notre Dame Press.
• Morgan, Vance G. (2005) Weaving the World: Simone Weil on Science, Mathematics, and Love. University of Notre Dame Press. ISBN 0-268-03486-9
• Plant, Stephen (2007) Simone Weil: a Brief Introduction, Orbis, ISBN 978-1-57075-753-2
• -----, (2007) The SPCK Introduction to Simone Weil, SPCK, ISBN 978-0-281-05938-6
• Radzins, Inese Astra (2006) Thinking Nothing: Simone Weil's Cosmology. ProQuest/UMI.
• Rhees, Rush (2000) Discussions of Simone Weil. State University of New York Press.
• Veto, Miklos (1994) The Religious Metaphysics of Simone Weil, Joan Dargan, trans. State University of New York Press.
• Winch, Peter (1989) Simone Weil: 'The Just Balance' . Cambridge University Press.
• Athanasios Moulakis (1998) Simone Weil and the Politics of Self-Denial. Translated from the German by Ruth Hein Publisher: University of Missouri Press Pub. ISBN 978-0-8262-1162-0 ^[34]

Biographies[link]

• Cabaud, Jacques. (1964). Simone Weil. Channel Press.
• Robert Coles (1989) Simone Weil: A Modern Pilgrimage. Addison-Wesley. ISBN-X. 2001 ed., Skylight Paths Publishing.
• Fiori, Gabriella (1989) Simone Weil: An Intellectual Biography. translated by Joseph R. Berrigan. University of Georgia Press. ISBN 0-8203-1102-2
• -----, (1991) Simone Weil. Una donna assoluta, La Tartaruga; Saggistica. ISBN 88-7738-075-6
• -----, (1993) Simone Weil. Une Femme Absolue Diffuseur-SODIS. ISBN 2-86645-148-1
• Finch, Henry Leroy (1999) Simone Weil and the Intellect of Grace. Continuum International Publishing.
• Gray, Francine Du Plessix (2001) Simone Weil. Viking Press.
• McLellan, David (1990) Utopian Pessimist: The Life and Thought of Simone Weil. New York: Poseidon Press. ISBN-X
• Nevin, Thomas R. (1991). Simone Weil: Portrait of a Self-Exiled Jew. Chapel Hill.
• Perrin, J.B. & Thibon, G. (1953). Simone Weil as We Knew Her. Routledge & Kegan Paul.
• Petrement, Simone (1976) Simone Weil: A Life. New York: Schocken Books. 1988 edition.
• Rexroth, Kenneth (1957) Simone Weil http://www.bopsecrets.org/rexroth/essays/simone-weil.htm
• Terry, Megan (1973). Approaching Simone: A Play. The Feminist Press.
• White, George A., editor (1981). Simone Weil: Interpretations of a Life. University of Massachusetts Press.
• Winch, Peter (1989) Simone Weil, the Just Balance. Cambridge
• Simone Weil: A Saint for Our Time? Magazine article by Jillian Becker; The New Criterion, Vol. 20, March 2002.

Audio recordings[link]

• Cayley, David (2002). Enlightened by Love: The Thought of Simone Weil. CBC Audio

See also[link]

	Anarchism portal
	Christianity portal

• List of Christian mystics
• Edith Stein
• Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Simone Weil

References[link]

External links[link]

This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (May 2010)

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Simone Weil

Historical Notes[link]

• O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Weil family", MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews, http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Weil_family.html .

Books online[link]

• Simone Weil, Thomas Stearns Eliot, A.F. Wills (1978). The Need for Roots. Routledge. ISBN 0-7100-8854-X. http://books.google.com/books?id=Wn09AAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=simone+weil&ei=qnqMSO6VKYiQjgGE6JDTBQ&sig=ACfU3U3gOt18TyhlIOfmLCY09XYjsThb9w.  (via Google Books)
• Simone Weil, Leslie A. Fielder (1953). Waiting For God. Capricorn Books. http://www.archive.org/details/waitingforgod013456mbp.  (Internet Archive)

Websites devoted to Weil[link]

• American Weil Society and 2009 Colloquy—Website for 2009 Colloquy at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville
• Welcome to the Simone Weil home page NEWS at www.rivertext.com—An unofficial page dedicated to Simone Weil
• Letter of Simone Weil to Déodat Roché (not translated to English)
• Simone Weil’s texts (Catalan translation)
• Center for Global Justice, Simone Weil on Labor
• simoneweil.net biographical notes, photos & bilingual quotes that illustrate key concepts, including force, necessity, attention and "le malheur"
• Works by Simone Weil (public domain in Canada)
• An Encounter with Simone Weil—Documentary on Weil by Julia Haslett, premiered in Amsterdam in November 2010

Andrew Thomas Weil (born June 8, 1942) is an American author and physician, who established the field of integrative medicine which attempts to integrate alternative and conventional medicine. Weil is the author of several best-selling books and operates a website and monthly newsletter promoting general health and healthy aging. He is the founder and program director of the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine (formerly the Program in Integrative Medicine), which he started in 1994 at the University of Arizona.^[1] He is frequently criticised for his promotion of alternative medicine,^[2][3][4] drug use and the potential conflicts of interest this raises in relation to his business dealings.^[5][6][7]

Andrew Weil was born to parents of German and Ukrainian descent. His parents owned a millinery store.^[8] He attended Harvard College and Harvard Medical School. As an undergraduate, Weil majored in botany and wrote his thesis on the narcotic properties of nutmeg,^[9] and also served as an editor of the Harvard Crimson and the Harvard Lampoon.^[10] After medical school, Weil did not seek residency. He completed a medical internship at Mt. Zion Hospital in San Francisco and subsequently worked for a year with the National Institute of Mental Health. From 1971-1974, he traveled throughout South America as a fellow for the Institute of Current World Affairs.^[11] He published his first book, The Natural Mind, in 1972. Weil has since written or co-written nine books, and was a regular contributor to High Times magazine from 1975 to 1983.^[12] His early works explored altered states of consciousness, but he has since expanded his scope to encompass healthy lifestyles and health care in general. In the last ten years, Weil has focused much of his work on the health concerns of older Americans. His book, Healthy Aging, looks at growing older from a physical, social and cross-cultural perspective, and emphasizes that aging cannot be reversed, but can be accompanied by good health, "serenity, wisdom, and its own kind of power and grace". His book, Why our Health Matters, is focused on health care reform.

Philosophy[link]

Weil's general view is that mainstream and alternative medicine are complementary approaches that should be utilized in conjunction with one another (what he terms integrative medicine). Specifically, he maintains that mainstream medicine is well-suited to crisis intervention, whereas alternative medicine is best utilized for prevention and health maintenance.^{[citation needed]} He promotes integrative medicine as a combination of both approaches. Nutrition, exercise, and stress reduction are emphasized in almost all of Weil's health works.

Because the nature of integrative medicine is to attempt to merge evidence based medicine with alternative medicine techniques, as well as partially focusing treatment on the "spiritual", it is not without controversy and regarded by many medical experts as pseudoscience. Accordingly, it falls into the same category of criticisms as much of alternative medicine does.^[3][13]

Dr. Arnold Relman, editor in chief emeritus of The New England Journal of Medicine wrote:

There are not two kinds of medicine, one conventional and the other unconventional, that can be practiced jointly in a new kind of 'integrative medicine.' Nor, as Andrew Weil and his friends also would have us believe, are there two kinds of thinking, or two ways to find out which treatments work and which do not. In the best kind of medical practice, all proposed treatments must be tested objectively. In the end, there will only be treatments that pass that test and those that do not, those that are proven worthwhile and those that are not. Can there be any reasonable 'alternative'?^[2]

Speaking of government funding studies of integrating alternative medicine techniques into the mainstream, Dr. Steven Novella, a neurologist at Yale School of Medicine wrote that it "is used to lend an appearance of legitimacy to treatments that are not legitimate." Dr. Marcia Angell, former executive editor of The New England Journal of Medicine says, "It's a new name for snake oil."^[3]

Weil has acknowledged the influence of many individuals, philosophical and spiritual ideas, and techniques on his approach to alternative medicine. Among the individuals who strongly influenced Weil's professional and personal life is the late osteopath Robert C. Fulford, who specialized in cranial manipulation.^[14][15]

Weil has previously expressed opposition to the war on drugs, citing the benefits of many banned plants. He promotes the medical use of whole-plants as a less problematic approach to treatment than synthetic pharmaceuticals. Weil has also written about the healing properties of medicinal mushrooms and Psilocybin (the active component in "magic mushrooms") in several of his books.

Honors[link]

• Forbes on-line magazine wrote: "Dr. Weil, a graduate of Harvard Medical School, is one of the most widely known and respected alternative medicine gurus. For five years, he has offered straightforward tips and advice on achieving wellness through natural means and educating the public on alternative therapies" and listed his web site in their Best of the Web Directory in the "Alternative Medicine" category,^[16] listing it as one of the three "Best of the Web" picks in that category.^[17]
• Weil appeared on the cover of Time Magazine in 1997 and 2005. Time Magazine also named him one of the 25 most influential Americans in 1997 and one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2005. He received the John P. McGovern Award in Behavioral Sciences from Smithsonian Associates in 2005.
• Mycologists Dr. Gustan Guzman, Fidel Tapia, and Paul Stamets honored Weil by naming a newly discovered mushroom, Psilocybe weilii, in 1995.
• Weil was honored by the Institute for Health and Healing in San Francisco as their 2006 Pioneer in Integrative Medicine.
• He was inducted into the Academy of Achievement in 1998.^[1]
• Weil was honored by the New York Open Center [2] in 2004 as having made "extraordinary contributions to public awareness of integrative and complementary medicine."

Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine (AzCIM)[link]

In 1994, Weil founded the Program in Integrative Medicine (PIM) at University Medical Center and the University of Arizona in Tucson.^{[citation needed]} It offers residential and research fellowship programs and operates an outpatient clinic according to Weil's principles; emphasizing prevention over treatment and focusing on nutrition, botanical medicines and mind-body interventions to complement conventional synthetic drug and surgery protocols. It also operates an annual Nutrition and Health Conference and a Botanical Medicine conference.^{[citation needed]} As of 2008, more than 450 physicians, physician assistants and nurse practitioners had completed the program. Weil says the expense associated with running PIM, reportedly $3 million annually, led him to agree to lend his name to commercial products to provide steady revenue for this and other research efforts in line with his philosophy.^{[citation needed]}

In April 2008, the Arizona Board of Regents recognized the Program as a Center of Excellence and renamed it the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine.^{[citation needed]} Since the founding of the University of Arizona program, academic instruction in integrative medicine has grown rapidly.^{[citation needed]} There are now 42 academic medical centers that offer integrative medicine programs, including the Mayo Clinic, Harvard Medical School and Georgetown, Duke and Columbia Universities.^{[citation needed]}

Diet advocacy[link]

Weil is a proponent of a diet rich in organic fruits and vegetables and regular consumption of fish. He is also an outspoken critic of partially hydrogenated oils. In an interview on Larry King Live, Weil claimed that sugar, starch, refined carbohydrates, and trans-fats are more dangerous to the human body than saturated fats. Weil is also an advocate for certain medicinal mushrooms in a daily diet.[3]

Timothy Leary and Harvard[link]

In Fall 1960 Weil was an 18-year-old Harvard freshman. He was already interested in doing research on mind-altering drugs. He learned of the Harvard Psilocybin Project that was being run by two Harvard professors: Dr. Timothy Leary and Dr. Richard Alpert (later known as Ram Dass). Weil interviewed with Leary and Alpert to become part of their project, but was turned away because he was an undergraduate. Leary and Alpert had made an agreement with Harvard that they would not use undergraduates in their project. After this, Weil and other undergraduates managed to procure mescaline, and they did their own experiments with it. Weil later stopped taking the drugs (at that time).^[18]

In May 1963, Weil was an editor of The Harvard Crimson. Leary and Alpert were continuing their activities amidst various controversies, including a criminal investigation of the project by Massachusetts authorities. The Harvard administration wanted to remove Alpert, and Weil was helping them to gather evidence against him. At this time Weil wrote an exposé article on Leary and Alpert for the Crimson.^[19] After the article was published, Alpert was fired for giving psychedelics to an undergraduate. Leary, who was already in Mexico when the article was published, was fired for "leaving Cambridge and his classes without permission."^[20][21]

Weil also wrote a negative article on the Harvard drug scandal for the November 1963 issue of Look magazine.^[22]

About five years later, Weil came to regret his actions with these articles. He reconciled his differences with Leary, and attempted to do the same with Alpert.^[23]

Drug use[link]

Weil has been very open about his own experimental and recreational use of numerous drugs including narcotics and mind-altering substances:

"I think I've tried about every drug in Chocolate to Morphine, although there may be one or two there that I haven't. I wouldn't write about any I didn't try, or if I did I would say that I hadn't tried it. There's a lot of things I've never come back for a second try for and there's some things I've used for varying periods and then stopped using."^[24]

He believes that there's no such thing as good drugs and bad drugs,^[24] and would recommend that his patients use Ecstasy (MDMA) if it were legal:

"In an exclusive interview with myprimetime.com, author and medical expert Dr. Andrew Weil explained that he would welcome the drug Ecstasy (MDMA) to his repertoire of patient recommendations if the drug was lawful."^[25]

He considers current methods and attitudes aimed at stopping "the drug problem" to be themselves problematic:

"I often have the suspicion that everything that we do in the name of stopping the drug problem is the drug problem. It's not just the laws but the whole mentality that sees drugs as the problem and tries to fight them. By doing that I think we've made it all worse."^[24]

Weil endorsed children's book about marijuana called "It's Just a Plant," writing, "A delightful book... a glimpse of what enlightened drug education could be." ^[26]

Criticisms[link]

Some have criticized Weil for promoting unverified beliefs. Weil's rejection of some aspects of evidence-based medicine and promotion of alternative medicine practices that are not verifiably efficacious has been criticized by noted physicians such as Arnold S. Relman in his 1998 article "A Trip to Stonesville: Some Notes on Andrew Weil".^[2] Weil has also promoted food products such as fruit and nut bars by combining his personal brand with Arran Stephens' Nature's Path brand.^[5]

Barry L. Beyerstein, PhD, Simon Fraser University, criticizes aspects of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM), asserting that "As a major New Age industry, CAM shares the movement's magical world-view. On advocating emotional criteria for truth over criteria based on empirical data and logic, New Age medical gurus such as Andrew Weil and Deepak Chopra have convinced many that 'anything goes,'" later stating that "By denigrating science, these detractors have enlarged the potential following for magical and pseudoscientific health product." ^[4] Simon Singh echoes this criticism going as far as saying that while Weil promotes some good things like exercise and less smoking that "much of his advice is nonsense".^[27]

In a debate between Dr. Weil and Dr. Steven Knope of Tucson, Arizona, televised on public television affiliate KUAT-TV, Knope is critical of Weil for what he considers irresponsible advocacy of untested treatments by Weil.^[28]

Regarding his journalism for Time Magazine (see publications, below), The Center for Science in the Public Interest pointed out that in one Time magazine column by Weil, he touts the benefits of fish oil supplements. CSPI stated, "The column was sparked by a recent report in the Journal of the American Medical Association showing that fish oil supplements did not reduce the risk of serious abnormal heart rhythms. The article failed to disclose that Dr. Weil sells his own brand of fish oil supplements on his website.".^[7] Healthwyze.org points out an additional conflict of interest with Time Magazine, stating, "Time Magazine featured Dr. Weil not once, but twice on its cover, for issues which were largely dedicated to him. One of the articles confessed that Time Magazine was a partner corporation of Time New Media, which was bargaining with Weil for an affiliation with his website." ^[6]

In 2009, the US Food and Drug Administration sent a warning letter to a company associated with Weil (Weil Lifestyle LLC) as a package of urgent measures to protect consumers from products that, without approval or authorization by FDA, claimed to diagnose, mitigate, prevent, treat or cure H1N1 Flu Virus in people. Weil Lifestyle had made several implicit claims in its marketing literature that certain products could help ward off the virus.^[29]

Books and publications[link]

Weil's writings span over thirty years and include the following ten books:

• The Natural Mind: An Investigation of Drugs and the Higher Consciousness (1972, rev. 2004)
• Marriage of Sun and Moon: Dispatches from the Frontiers of Consciousness (1980, rev. 2004)
• Health and Healing (1983, rev. 2004)
• with Winifred Rosen, 1983 (2004), From Chocolate to Morphine: Everything you need to know about mind-altering drugs, Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin, ISBN 0-618-48379-9 
• Spontaneous Healing (1995)
• Natural Health, Natural Medicine (1995, rev. 2004)
• 8 Weeks to Optimum Health (1997, rev. 2006)
• Eating Well for Optimum Health (2000)
• Breathing: The Master Key to Self Healing, audio CD, Sounds True (2000)
• The Healthy Kitchen with Rosie Daley (2002)
• Healthy Aging (2005)
• Why Our Health Matters (September 2009)
• Spontaneous Happiness (2011)

He has written forewords for books by Paul Stamets, Lewis Mehl-Madrona, Tolly Burkan, and Wade Davis, among others.

Weil occasionally writes articles for Time Magazine and Huffington Post.^[30][31]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Andrew Weil

• Andrew Weil official website
• Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine, formerly the Program in Integrative Medicine, University of Arizona

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (February 2009)

Vicky Leandros
Vicky Leandros in Berlin, 2010
Background information
Birth name	Vassiliki Papathanasiou
Also known as	Vicky Leandros
Born	(1949-08-23) 23 August 1949 (age 62)
Origin	Palaiokastritsa, Corfu, Greece
Genres	Pop
Occupations	Singer, politician
Years active	1965–present
Website	Hey! Vicky Leandros Vicky Leandros' Greek website

Vicky Leandros (born Vassiliki Papathanasiou, Greek: Βασιλική Παπαθανασίου, 23 August 1949,^[1] now legally Vassiliki, Baroness von Ruffin) is a Greek singer with a long international career. She is the daughter of singer, musician and composer Leandros Papathanasiou (known as Leo Leandros – composer pseudonym Mario Panas). She achieved worldwide fame after winning the Eurovision Song Contest in 1972 with the song "Après Toi" (representing Luxembourg).

Early career[link]

Leandros was born in Palaiokastritsa, a resort on the island of Corfu in the Ionian Sea. Her father wanted to expand his career and went to Germany while she grew up at her grandmother's house until the age of eight. In 1958 her parents took her to Germany where she stayed with her father permanently after her parents' divorce. She revealed her talent at a young age while taking guitar, music, dance, ballet and voice lessons.

In 1965 Leandros released her first single "Messer, Gabel, Schere, Licht". This was the beginning of a successful career for her with her father as composer, manager and producer. In 1967 she received an offer to sing for Luxembourg at the Eurovision Song Contest with the song "L'amour est bleu". She finished in fourth place but the song became one of the biggest worldwide hits of the year and was covered by many artists. She was shortly singing in eight languages with her albums, singles and EPs being sold all over the world. She became particularly successful in Japan and Canada.

The 1970s[link]

In 1970 her first TV show, Ich Bin was broadcast in 13 European countries. It received many awards for its originality and thought-provoking contemporary graphics including in 1971 the world famous Bronze Rose of Montreux. It was also the first time that Vicky used the same stage surname as her father (actually his real Christian name) and became known from then onwards as Vicky Leandros having been known simply as Vicky during the 1960s. Guests appearing were Julien Clerc and Deep Purple. The show has been repeated over the years and is seen as a classic piece very evocative of the era, though at first it was not well received in all quarters owing to its surprising, even shocking, imagery, in an age when songs were not generally accompanied by visuals for marketing purposes. Throughout the 1970s other film portraits by prominent film makers were to follow which attracted interest around the world. She later went on to host a television series in the UK for the BBC, entitled Music My Way.

In 1972 she represented Luxembourg at Eurovision for the second time and won the contest with the song "Après Toi". Translated into English as "Come What May" it was also a hit in the UK reaching #2 on the UK Singles Chart.^[2] Globally it sold over six million copies, and was awarded a gold disc.^[3] Leandros recorded the song in seven languages. Later in the year she released her version of the Theodorakis composition "O Kaymos (Sorrow) (The Love in Your Eyes)" which became a hit all over the world in various language versions. It peaked at #40 in the UK Singles Chart.^[2] In 1973, "When Bouzoukis Played" became another massive selling world hit in several languages, reaching #44 in the UK chart.^[2] In 1974 she recorded "Theo, wir fahr'n nach Lodz" a song that was a #1 hit in Germany. She also found much success in South Africa during the 1970s.

In Japan she reached her peak during late 1960s and early 1970s and recorded many times in Japanese. Her second Japanese single "Watashi no Sukina Chocolate" (The Chocolate That I Like) became a notable hit. She also recorded many cover versions of songs, "Mamy Blue", "You Don't Have To Say You Love Me" and "My Sweet Lord" among others.

In 1975 she recorded an album, Across the Water in Tennessee and Miami. The album was a departure for her, combining country, rock and soul, gaining her good reviews on release in the US. In 1976 she signed a multi-million contract with CBS Records for albums in the US and started working in Hollywood with Kim Fowley. This did not last long however as Leandros felt a lack of support from her record company and returned to Europe.

After her American adventure Leandros released albums of German folk songs, Christmas songs and a Spanish album which became a success in Spain and all over Latin America. The first single "Oh Mi Mama" was a minor hit, but the second single "Tu Me Has Hecho Sentir", although not promoted by Leandros or CBS due to differences between the two and a reported health scare, was a big hit in Spanish-speaking countries in 1979. It regularly appears on compilation albums and is easily the most famous and remembered song by Vicky Leandros in Spanish . A new album, Wie am Allerersten Tag went unreleased and Leandros became pregnant and took time off over the next 18 months.

The 1980s[link]

In 1981 she recorded the album Love is Alive including duets with Demis Roussos, Johnny Hallyday and US star David Soul for a United Nations Benefit. Also in 1981, she released the album, Ich Gehe Neue Wege and its Greek version, Irtha Yia Sena. This comeback was consolidated in 1982 by the success of the song "Verlorenes Paradies" from the same titled next album which saw Leandros back in the upper reaches of the singles charts in many territories after a few years absence. It was also recorded in Dutch . In 1983 came the album Vicky containing the popular song and single "Gruesse an Sarah" which is regularly still sung in concerts often a cappella with the other musicians and vocalists making the sounds of the beats and instruments vocally to combine with Leandros' main vocal. Also later in 1983 she recorded again in Dutch a song specially for the Dutch-speaking market; "Ver Van Het Leven". In 1984, the French version - "A l'Est d'Eden" - was a big success in France, reaching #2 on the singles chart. This single and corresponding album (Vicky) gave Leandros a notable comeback in Canada and she toured there after a gap of many years in 1985. Two more single releases from the album also became Canadian hits - "Tu as sept Ponts a traverser" and "Salut bien Sarah" the French version of "Gruesse an Sarah".

In 1986 following the success of her 1985 album Eine Nacht in Griechenland Leandros again took time off to concentrate on her private life. The album achieved Gold status in the Benelux and German speaking countries. It was early 1988 before the next album release "Ich Bin Ich" on which she worked with Klaus (Nick) Munro. This album contained many new rhythms and was more rock orientated . Leandros did not tour though and made very limited appearances during this period concentrating mainly on her family life and her ( by now three ) young children . Nevertheless two singles were released from the album "Du hast schon laengst Goodbye gesagt" and "Oh Oh Oh" in a remixed version .

In 1989 she returned to her music career and charted highly in Greece with her comeback album, Piretos tou Erota.

The 1990s[link]

In 1990 Leandros released the album "Starkes Gefuehl" (Strong Feeling) which notably contained a new version of "Apres Toi" her Eurovision song contest winner of 1972 . The album also contained the German version of Piretos tou erota now "Suchtig nach Geborgenheit" which was the first single cut . The early 1990s saw her scoring successful albums in Greece with "Prosexe" in 1991 ( Nur Einen Augenblick in Germany ) and "Andres" ( unique album for Greece ) in 1993 and in Europe in 1994/5 with singles "Du Bist Mein Schoenster Gedanke" and a duet with Tony Christie, "We're Gonna Stay Together".

The resurgence of popularity in Greece saw first the re-release on vinyl of Leandros' early albums (with different sleeves) and later a CD release of them all with bonus tracks.

From 1995 to 1998 she collaborated with German hit-maker Jack White and released three Top-10 albums, as well as the German version of the Titanic song "My Heart Will Go On". This song "Weil mein Herz dich nie mehr vergisst" gave Leandros her highest charting record since Verlorenes Paradies in 1982.

Recent career[link]

In 2000 she started producing her own records. The album Jetzt / Now was a success and her own compositions received critical praise. Her duet with Chris De Burgh was one of the highlights of the album. Following this she featured again on the charts of several countries such as Canada, China, Japan, Belgium and South Africa due to the many greatest hits collections that several companies released.

In 2003 she recorded a new album, Tragoudi Alliotiko with songs by Mikis Theodorakis accompanied by the Kamerata Orchestra under Theodorakis's supervision. The album became a success in Germany, central Europe and in Greece. TV stations and tabloid newspaper reviewers celebrated her comeback while other publications and reviewers questioned the rationale behind Leandros' performance of songs from a political composer like Theodorakis. Around this time Leandros appeared in many TV shows on German and Greek television including galas with José Carreras. The album made it to the 100 best selling records of 2003 and Theodorakis wrote that he considered "her among the two or three most important interpreters of [his] work". In 2003 Leandros received two prestigious awards from the Greek government for her promotion of Greek culture and music abroad and the other from the Greek Orthodox Church in recognition of her work for poor children in Africa. The latter award was presented to her at a classical concert held at the Herod Atticus amphitheatre in October 2003 and is the highest honour that the Greek Church can bestow. Leandros is one of only a few to receive it and the only female.

2005 saw the release of a double album, Ich Bin Wie Ich Bin containing new recordings of Leandros's songs. The album charted in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Leandros' Jubilee Tour of Europe started in February 2006.

In March 2006, Leandros took part in the German pre-selection for the Eurovision Song Contest - 34 years since "Après Toi". Her song, "Don't Break My Heart" which had already entered the charts, failed to win the most votes from the televoting public.

Leandros released a CD in March 2009 titled Möge der Himmel. This album contained soul elements combined with some R&B flavour, hip hop and rap. The change in direction was headline news and the album received mixed reviews. The next album Zeitlos in 2010 returned to the idea born in 2008 of recording a collection of French songs and World hits in the German language.

In 2011, Leandros re-recorded her hit "L'amour est bleu" as "C'est Bleu" for the Scooter album The Big Mash Up. The unusual collaboration was named a highlight of the record and was released as a single on December 2, 2011.

Personal life[link]

From 1982 until 1986 Leandros was married to Greek entrepreneur Ivan Zissiadis. He is the father of her son Leandros Zissiadis (Leo) (born 6 June 1980). In 2005 Leandros and her second husband Enno von Ruffin separated after 19 years of marriage. The couple has two daughters: Maximiliane von Ruffin (Milana) (born 31 January 1985) and Alessandra von Ruffin (Sandra) (born 6 December 1986). On 15 October 2006, Leandros (as Vassiliki von Ruffin) was elected town councillor of the Greek harbour town of Piraeus on the Pasok list. Her task concerned the Cultural and International development of Piraeus. She was also Deputy Mayor of Piraeus.

It was announced in June 2008 that Leandros decided to leave her position in Greek politics with immediate effect stating that she had under estimated the work load and time needed to fulfill her political obligations and that it had become impossible to combine those duties with her singing career .^{[citation needed]}

Awards and collaborations[link]

Leandros has received innumerable awards including gold and platinum records from all around the world for discs that have sold in excess of 150 million copies.^{[citation needed]}

She has worked with many composers and producers such as Kim Fowley, Leo Leandros, Brad Shapiro and Michel Legrand and also with conductors such as Herbert von Karajan and Claude Denjean. She has been awarded with the "Bronze Rose of Montreux", "Goldene Europa", "Record Award of USA", and "Song Statue of Japan".

• 1967: Fourth place at the Eurovision with the song „L´amour est bleu“
• 1968: Goldene Europa
• 1971: Bronze Rose von Montreux for the TV-Show "Ich bin"
• 1971: Bronze Lion of the Radio Luxembourg
• 1972: First Place at theEurovision with the song "Aprés toi“
• 1972: Best Selling Artist Internationally
• 1974: Goldene Europa
• 2001: Goldene Stimmgabel German pop
• 2001: Internationaler Schlagerpreis in the category of „Beste Künstlerin International“
• 2003: Hospitality Zeus
• 2005: Woman of the year in Greece

Selected discography[link]

Albums[link]

Many variations of Leandros's albums were released around the world and a huge amount of compilations which still continue to be released on a regular basis . The following list is of original albums she recorded. In Japan a few albums also contain some songs mainly in Japanese or English which were not released elsewhere though the majority of tracks were recorded in Europe and featured also in various languages on albums already listed here.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official Homepage of Vicky Leandros
• Greek Official Political Homepage of Vicky Leandros
• German Homepage and Fanclub of Vicky Leandros
• Official Homepage of Vicky Leandros′ daughter Sandra Ruffin

Awards and achievements
Preceded by Séverine with "Un banc, un arbre, une rue"	Winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 1972	Succeeded by Anne-Marie David with "Tu te reconnaîtras"
Preceded by Monique Melsen	Luxembourg in the Eurovision Song Contest 1972	Succeeded by Anne-Marie David
Preceded by Michèle Torr	Luxembourg in the Eurovision Song Contest 1967	Succeeded by Chris Baldo & Sophie Garel

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