French elections: 5 things you didn't know about Emmanuel Macron
Two aspects of Emmanuel Macron's story are very well known - he created a new party was elected president at the age of just 39, having never before held elected office, and his wife is the much older woman who he met while he was just a teenager. But here's some things you might not know about him.
1 He's pretty nippy in midfield - We're talking football here, Macron is a lifelong supporter of Olympique Marseille, despite being from Amiens which is pretty much the opposite end of the country to Marseille (although this is not usual, Paris-Saint-Germain and Olympique Marseille have fans all over France).
He also plays, taking part in a charity football match in late 2021, where footage shows him taking a penalty. True to political form, his shot went straight down the centre to find the goal.
VIDEO Macron's charity football game
2 He was actually only a banker for four years - One of the things that is often cited about Macron is that he's a former investment banker - and it's true he worked for the private Rothschild & Cie Banque between 2008 and 2012.
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But in his working life before becoming president at the age of 39, only four years were spent at the bank. The rest of his career was working as a technocrat and economic adviser, before taking up a role in François Hollande's government in 2012.
3 He's a bit of an anglophile - Undoubtedly a proud Frenchman, keen to restore France to glory on the world stage, Macron is also a fluent English-speaker and enjoys a bit of anglophone culture, according to his former PM Edouard Philippe, who revealed in his book that he and the president had discussed theories of power in relation to Star Wars and Game of Thrones.
Macron also has an English great-grandfather, although he never met him.
4 He is a (possibly erotic) novelist - Macron has often said that his first dream was to become a writer and it's known that as a very young man he wrote a book telling the story of a young man falling in love.
Very few people claim to have actually read this so it's not clear whether is merely a romance or something a little spicier. If he has written erotica it doesn't make him unusual - it seems to be practically compulsory for French politicians.
5 He has blue eyes like a lake in the sunshine - Well, that's according to his economy minister Bruno Le Maire, who described Macron as having “a blue gaze tinted by metallic sparkles, like a lake burdened with sunshine whose surface it would have been impossible, under the scintillating reflections, to pierce” in his most recent book.
He certainly has blue eyes and he also appears to have the politician's trick of charming his audience, many people report being convinced and converted after a one-to-one meeting with the president.
And the thing that everyone 'knows'
Macron has repeatedly paid tribute to the influence that his grandmother Manette, a teacher, had on his childhood.
But the other great influence on his life is another teacher, his wife Brigitte. The two have faced down decades of gossip, jokes and hostility due to their unconventional relationship with its 24-year age gap, which began when he was still at school and she was a teacher, married with teenage children.
But 26 years after meeting they are still together and after a rocky start Brigitte's adult children from her first marriage now reportedly have a good relationship with the stepfather who is close to them in age. His stepchildren campaigned for him in 2017.
The couple have no children of their own, but have adopted a rescue dog - Nemo.
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1 He's pretty nippy in midfield - We're talking football here, Macron is a lifelong supporter of Olympique Marseille, despite being from Amiens which is pretty much the opposite end of the country to Marseille (although this is not usual, Paris-Saint-Germain and Olympique Marseille have fans all over France).
He also plays, taking part in a charity football match in late 2021, where footage shows him taking a penalty. True to political form, his shot went straight down the centre to find the goal.
VIDEO Macron's charity football game
2 He was actually only a banker for four years - One of the things that is often cited about Macron is that he's a former investment banker - and it's true he worked for the private Rothschild & Cie Banque between 2008 and 2012.
READ ALSO
- 5 things you didn't know about Marine Le Pen
- 5 things you didn't know about Valérie Pécresse
- 5 things you didn't know about Eric Zemmour
- 5 things you didn't know about Jean-Luc Mélenchon
- 5 things you didn't know about Fabien Roussel
- 5 things you didn't know about Yannick Jadot
- 5 things you didn't know about Anne Hidalgo
- 5 things you didn't know about Jean Lassalle
- 5 things you didn't know about Philippe Poutou
- 5 things you didn't know about Nathalie Arthaud
- 5 things you didn't know about Nicolas Dupont-Aignan
But in his working life before becoming president at the age of 39, only four years were spent at the bank. The rest of his career was working as a technocrat and economic adviser, before taking up a role in François Hollande's government in 2012.
3 He's a bit of an anglophile - Undoubtedly a proud Frenchman, keen to restore France to glory on the world stage, Macron is also a fluent English-speaker and enjoys a bit of anglophone culture, according to his former PM Edouard Philippe, who revealed in his book that he and the president had discussed theories of power in relation to Star Wars and Game of Thrones.
Macron also has an English great-grandfather, although he never met him.
4 He is a (possibly erotic) novelist - Macron has often said that his first dream was to become a writer and it's known that as a very young man he wrote a book telling the story of a young man falling in love.
Very few people claim to have actually read this so it's not clear whether is merely a romance or something a little spicier. If he has written erotica it doesn't make him unusual - it seems to be practically compulsory for French politicians.
5 He has blue eyes like a lake in the sunshine - Well, that's according to his economy minister Bruno Le Maire, who described Macron as having “a blue gaze tinted by metallic sparkles, like a lake burdened with sunshine whose surface it would have been impossible, under the scintillating reflections, to pierce” in his most recent book.
He certainly has blue eyes and he also appears to have the politician's trick of charming his audience, many people report being convinced and converted after a one-to-one meeting with the president.
And the thing that everyone 'knows'
Macron has repeatedly paid tribute to the influence that his grandmother Manette, a teacher, had on his childhood.
But the other great influence on his life is another teacher, his wife Brigitte. The two have faced down decades of gossip, jokes and hostility due to their unconventional relationship with its 24-year age gap, which began when he was still at school and she was a teacher, married with teenage children.
But 26 years after meeting they are still together and after a rocky start Brigitte's adult children from her first marriage now reportedly have a good relationship with the stepfather who is close to them in age. His stepchildren campaigned for him in 2017.
The couple have no children of their own, but have adopted a rescue dog - Nemo.
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