His novel “La Cité de la Joy” sold at 8 million copies had a surge of generosity in the direction of Calcutta in all the countries where it was translated. The successful adventurer and writer died on December 2 at the age of 91.
by Julien Bouissou
Adventurer, successful writer and honorary citizen of Calcutta, the honorary title of which he was most proud, Dominique Lapierre died, Friday, December 2 on the Côte d’Azur, at the age of 91.
Under his pen, the megalopolis of Western Bengal has been associated, and for a long time, at the Cité de la Joy (ed. Robert Laffont, 1985), a great romantic fresco in which the routes of an American doctor intersect , of a French priest and a rush shooter who are out of the hell of misery, armed with their only hope. The writer then spent two years in this clutter of alleys crowded with garbage, rats, and residents who spend their lives surviving, in the slum of Pilkhana, before going to writing in front of these three words posed on His office: “Odors, colors, noises” to be sure not to forget any detail.
The novel is sold to at least 8 million copies, and immediately, a surge of generosity towards Calcutta rises in all the countries where it is translated. At that time, humanitarian aid mobilized crowds, stars of English pop sing against famine and Bernard Kouchner, the Minister of Health and Humanitarian Action between 1992 and 1993, carries bags of rice on his shoulders .
decorated in India
a Calcutta, the writer who makes his motto “all that is not given is lost”, engages with his wife Dominique Conchon-Lapierre in humanitarian actions financed by his copyright. Schools and dispensaries are open, wells are dug, micro-credits are distributed and the hostems are circulating in the Sundarbans archipelago, at the mouth of the Ganges.
years later, when India is organized by its economic takeoff and marveling from the success of its great fortunes, Dominique Lapierre continues to remind the existence of his poor. He is one of the few French people to have been decorated, in 2008, from the Padma Bhushan, or “Lotus adornment” from the hands of the President of India Pratibha Patil, for her actions in favor of the poorest. >
of the five continents where he went to write great historical frescoes, on apartheid in South Africa (a rainbow in the night, Éd. Robert Laffont, 2008), the departure of the English of Palestine (O Jerusalem, ed. Robert Laffont, 1971) or the liberation of Paris (Paris burns ?, Ed. Robert Laffont, 1965), India is the only place where it returns regularly.
The adventure at 17 2>
At the beginning of the 1970s, he made a first two -year stay there, in the company of his “Plume brother” Larry Collins, to document and investigate the country’s independence in 1947, thanks to the precious help From Lord Mountbatten, the former Governor of the Indies who opens his personal archives to them. The book this night Liberty (ed. Robert Laffont, 1975), published in forty international editions, was a great success.
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