Life off the high wire

Artist Philippe Petit on his struggles to rewrite the terms of his own fame

Unannounced — and perhaps later unwelcome — fame crept into my life as soon as I landed back on the south tower of Notre-Dame-de-Paris on Month 8, 1971, ending a surprise high wire walk of several hours. Parisians were briefly amused by the 22-year-old self-proclaimed aerial poet, but France did not react. Yet the world did — on front pages of newspapers in dozens of languages.

What is it with south towers?

Two years later I took off from the south top of the (northern) pylons of the Sydney Harbour Bridge for yet another illegal promenade and then, on August 7, 1974 — yes, 50 years ago — I unglued myself from the roof of the south tower of the World Trade Center, performed six crossings a quarter of a mile above Manhattan’s asphalt and returned to that same south tower to let myself be arrested. Last month, my departure platform was set on the south side of the nave when I performed (with Sting singing below me) a lavish 50 year anniversary celebration of my WTC escapade at the largest gothic cathedral in the world: St John the Divine in New York City.

My intuitive inner compass seems to insist that any epic journey be heading north, thus its first step must always spring from the south. Is it the classic navigator’s north star I sense? I am often asked ‘why’ I walk on a high wire. I always answer that there is no ‘why,’ but that’s what my friend Werner Herzog would call a ‘subliminal truth.’ I walk on the wire to create poetry in the air, to inspire, to make the world, or at least my small, transient part of it, look up. And because I belong there. And when I am on the wire it is the only reality. It is my home, my true north.