The Former French President to Pen Prison Memoir Documenting Two Dozen Days Behind Bars

Nicolas Sarkozy will soon publish a memoir in the coming weeks named Diary of a Prisoner, detailing his experience spent in custody.

This news emerged less than two weeks following the former president gained freedom while he appeals his conviction related to illegal collaboration regarding a scheme to obtain presidential race money linked to the regime of former Libyan leader.

Life Behind Bars: Solitary Musings

“In prison one sees little, with little to occupy time,” he notes in a preview, suggesting the book is more about his musings during isolation rather than extensive analysis of the overcrowded and struggling jail system in France.

“Silence escapes me, which doesn’t exist in La Santé, where there is a lot to hear,” he states. “The noise unfortunately never stops. However, akin to empty spaces, one’s inner world is strengthened in prison.”

Release Hearing: Recounting the Hardship

While appealing for release, the former leader participated remotely from a room in prison, depicting prison life as exhausting. He had told the court: “I must acknowledge those working in the jail, displaying remarkable compassion, easing this ordeal tolerable – as it truly is one.”

“I never imagined that in my seventies, I’d be in prison. It’s an ordeal I must endure. I confess it’s hard, it’s very hard. It leaves a mark on any prisoner because it’s gruelling.”

First of Its Kind

He, who led the nation between 2007 and 2012, was the first ex-leader in the European Union and the initial post-WWII figure from France to serve time in prison.

Before entering jail he had said he planned to utilize the opportunity to write a book.

Cell Library

Unconfirmed is did he manage to review and analyze the three books he took into prison: a two-volume biography of Jesus together with Dumas’s work The Count of Monte Cristo, a plot where a wrongfully accused individual is imprisoned later flees to seek vengeance.

Life in Confinement

He was held in isolation to protect him in a room of about nine sq metres including private facilities in the Paris jail in the city. Two bodyguards were stationed in an adjacent room.

It was stated his diet consisted only yoghurts while inside due to concerns prison cuisine might have been spat on. Options were available to prepare his own meals but refused this, according to reports. It is uncertain if the memoir includes his dietary choices.

Defense Viewpoint

The legal representative, who visited his client daily throughout the jail term, told the release hearing security would be better outside jail rather than in custody. “He has faced threats against his life, heard shouts during nighttime and emergency responses in a neighbouring cell as a detainee harmed themselves.”

Charges and Sentence

Sarkozy went to prison on 21 October when a Paris court imposed a half-decade term for criminal conspiracy over a scheme to obtain campaign funds for his presidential bid.

He denies wrongdoing and is contesting the ruling, and another court case planned for next spring.