A biography for Philippe Petithasn’t been written yet.
“It's impossible, that's for sure. So let's start working.”
“I was born in a world of opera, theatre, films, poetry, art, and therefore, out of the wire, I made a stage. That's why they call me a high wire artist.”
“My parents wanted me to have an honorable profession and not to be a jester.”
“I was never part of the sailing circle, but I enjoy when I'm invited to sail.”
“As a high wire walker, I do not allow myself to 'leave the wire' during a performance.”
“I was thrown out of different schools because I was practicing my arts - magic, juggling, and the high wire.”
“When you are a young person, the world is yours. You can do the impossible.”
“Every year, I am conscious of the anniversary of my 1974 World Trade Center walk.”
“Fame was never something I was seeking in my artistic journey. It's to be used as a tool for an artist to break open doors and keep creating. That's how I enjoyed fame in '74; it was not just for the emptiness of being famous.”
“If I see three oranges, I have to juggle. And if I see two towers, I have to walk.”
“Usually, when I walk on a wire, I inspect the anchor point on both sides before crossing.”
“Faith is what replaces doubt in my dictionary.”
“Notre Dame and Sydney - that was nothing. Notre Dame doesn't have a police station; it is not 1,000 or so feet high. It was a public structure, very easy to access. And Sydney Harbour Bridge was half-and-half: a bridge, in the middle of the night. The World Trade Center was the end of the world. Electronic devices, police dogs.”
“It is very normal for people on the ground to look at somebody apparently walking in midair and thinking first that person is crazy and thinking secondly that person risks his or her life.”
“To be able to create fully, it's maybe fine that you learn the rules, but you have to forget and to rebel against those rules.”
“I didn't go to school much. I was thrown out of different schools, and my university is the street.”
“I, like everybody else, have a certain fear of heights, and I have to be very careful when I am in the clouds, but it is also what I love; it is my domain, so when you love something, you don't have fear.”
“I keep saying I am an auto-didact, but I have a lot of outside influences. One I could cite is juggler Francis Brunn, who was the first man to throw ten rings in the air; he was really an amazing juggler who showed onstage the quest for perfection.”
“I love to remember the World Trade Centre walk, but it should not define me.”
“I started very early, from five or six years old, to climb. To climb trees, to climb rocks everywhere I could. At some point, of course, I used a rope.”