Bernard-Henri Lévy, The Tabernacle

Bernard-Henri Lévy recently described Donald Trump as a ‘Las Vegas croupier, this kitschy carnival performer, coiffed and botoxed.’ As you might have guessed, the philosopher and bestselling writer pulls no punches. In his own words: 'Those who hate me, it is their problem’.

Known in his native France as BHL, he and his wife (the actress and singer Arielle Dombasle) are something of a celebrity couple over the Channel, and the Guardian has said he is 'accorded the kind of adulation in France that most countries reserve for their rock stars.'

And with his shirt open to the fourth button and his steely hair sticking up wildly, he couldn’t look more louche and Gallic. But his credentials are impressive: Lévy started out as a war reporter for Combat, the renowned newspaper set up by Camus during the Nazi occupation, before founding the New Philosophers group.

On Sunday 8 May, he will talk at the Tabernacle about conflict in the Middle East, a wide topic that will take in Islam, Islamic State, Kurdistan and the Peshmerga. It’s a subject that Lévy will no doubt have some strong opinions on.