The line is the English form of “Soyez réalistes, demandez l’impossible,” a slogan written on a wall at Censier during the May 1968 uprising in Paris. Wikiquote ↗ records it from Julien Besançon’s 1968 collection Les murs ont la parole. No known writing or speech of Che Guevara contains it.
“Be realistic, demand the impossible” Anonymous wall slogan (“Soyez réalistes, demandez l’impossible”), Censier, Paris, May 1968, recorded in Julien Besançon, Les murs ont la parole (Tchou, 1968). Not Che Guevara. · Verbatim: “Soyez réalistes, demandez l'impossible. (Be realistic, demand the impossible.)”
⚠ The slide-ready mistake: crediting this to Che Guevara. Use the credit shown above instead.
Can you use it?
? We couldn’t verify where this wording comes from, so there’s no rights status to give. Safe to present as an unverified or anonymous line — just don’t assert a specific author or source.
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In context
Evoking the themes of hope, courage and change. Theme: "Be realistic, demand the impossible". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.
Minimalist
Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "Be realistic, demand the impossible". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.
Provenance
Where it actually appears
Original
Soyez réalistes, demandez l'impossible.
Where
Wall slogan, Censier (Paris), May 1968
Recorded in
Julien Besançon, Les murs ont la parole: journal mural, Mai 68 (Tchou, 1968), p. 89
Translation
Anonymous; common English form “Be realistic, demand the impossible”
“Soyez réalistes, demandez l’impossible.” “Be realistic: Demand the impossible!”
May 1968 wall slogan
The French wall slogan and the English translation given by Wikiquote’s May 68 page, which places it at Censier and cites Besançon (1968), p. 89.
Wikiquote’s May 68 page ↗ lists “Soyez réalistes, demandez l’impossible” among the slogans, with the location Censier. It cites Julien Besançon, Les murs ont la parole (Tchou, 1968), p. 89.
The Besançon book is catalogued at the Internet Archive ↗ (Paris: Tchou, 1968). The scan is lending-restricted, so we have not read page 89 ourselves.
The French Wikipedia article “Soyez réalistes, demandez l’impossible” ↗ records the slogan on a wall at the Censier faculty. It also gives an origin account, quoted from Christophe Bident’s 1998 biography of Maurice Blanchot.
The slogan was anonymous and collective, written on a Paris wall in May 1968, and no individual author or rights holder is known. The usual English form is a widely repeated translation with no single identifiable translator. Besançon’s 1968 compilation is a modern book, but it records the slogan rather than authoring it, so we assert no copyright status for the wording.
Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.
Fact-check
Why it gets pinned on Che
Che Guevara’s face became a symbol of 1968-era radicalism, so a famous radical slogan of that year often ends up under his name in quote collections. None of those collections cites a speech, letter or book.
✕
Quote sites, posters and social mediaChe Guevara Popular credit
No text by Guevara has been shown to contain the line. Wikiquote’s sourced Che Guevara page ↗ does not list it, while Wikiquote’s May 68 page ↗ records it as a wall slogan at Censier. Guevara was killed on 9 October 1967, according to Wikipedia ↗, before the May 1968 events where the slogan is documented.
✕
Radical-history writingThe Situationist International Loose credit
The slogan is often grouped with Situationist graffiti. For example, the Bureau of Public Secrets ↗ includes “Be realistic, demand the impossible” in its May 1968 graffiti list. A PM Press essay ↗ calls it a Situationist epigram but admits “we don’t know the actual context”. Neither source names an individual author.
✓The documented source is a wall at Censier in May 1968, recorded in Besançon’s Les murs ont la parole (1968), as cited by Wikiquote ↗. It is not a line by Che Guevara.
Context
The story behind the slogan
Accounts of how the slogan arose differ. One account, quoted on French Wikipedia ↗ from Christophe Bident’s biography of Maurice Blanchot, goes like this. At the Renault factory in Billancourt, a union man told two activists, “Il faut être réaliste, il ne faut pas demander l’impossible”: you have to be realistic, you must not demand the impossible. That afternoon at Censier, the activists had paper and a printer and were looking for themes, and they turned his phrase around. Mascolo, the man quoted, called it “une intuition collective”.
The Brussels arts center BOZAR ↗ tells the same Renault story and names photographer and publisher Jean Mascolo as the man who painted the slogan on a Paris wall. It notes that “there are many versions” of how the slogan came about. Either way, the line began as a sarcastic reversal of a cautious reply, not as a maxim from a revolutionary leader.
“Il faut être réaliste, il ne faut pas demander l’impossible.”
Why the Che version persists
Guevara was a hero to many 1968 protesters, and his image appeared at demonstrations, so later readers easily merged the two. Some Spanish-language versions, such as “Seamos realistas, pidamos lo imposible”, also circulate under his name, but we found no primary source for any of them in his writings.
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The true origin
Who wrote it
68
Anonymous — May 1968, Paris
May 1968 · slogan of the Paris student and worker uprising
During May 1968, protesters covered the walls of Paris universities and streets with slogans. Most of them were anonymous and many were collective. “Soyez réalistes, demandez l’impossible” is one of the best known. It was recorded on a wall at Censier, part of the University of Paris, and collected that year by Julien Besançon in Les murs ont la parole. One participant’s account calls it “une intuition collective”, a collective intuition, rather than the work of one author.
For writers & researchers
Cite this
Earliest documented in
Julien Besançon, ed., Les murs ont la parole: Journal mural, Mai 68 (Paris: Tchou, 1968), 89 (“Soyez réalistes, demandez l’impossible,” Censier), as cited in Wikiquote, “May 68.” Anonymous wall slogan, anonymous English translation; not by Che Guevara.
This verification page
Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘Be realistic, demand the impossible’?” Last verified 2 Nov 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/be-realistic-demand-the-impossible/