The well-known French author, Dominique Lapierre, died of old age on December 2, 2022. He was 91. He had a passion for writing, travelling, and automobiles. He also had a passion for India. Two of his books about India are particularly worth-mentioning: Five Past Midnight in Bhopal and The City of Joy, and both these books were adapted into films, namely A Cloud over Bhopal and City of Joy, respectively. He was a well-known French author in India.

Career

Lapierre was born on July 30, 1931, in Chatelaillon, in France. He studied about the Aztec civilisation in Mexico. He received a Fulbright Scholarship to study economics at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, USA. To earn for his adventurous existence apart from writing, he washed windows in churches, gave lectures, and even worked as a siren cleaner on a boat.

He fell in love with Conchon and got married to her on his 21st birthday. Along with her, he went on a honeymoon in his 1937 model Chrysler for about a year, travelling around the world. On his return to France, Lapierre wrote his second book, Honeymoon around the Earth.

After his return from honeymoon, he was conscripted into the French Army where he happened to meet an American soldier, Larry Collins, who was a Yale Graduate. They became good friends. Having been discharged from the Army, Lapierre found work as a reporter for the magazine ‘Paris Match’. On several occasions, Collins and Lapierre met while on assignment. Thus, they decided to jointly write a book to appeal French and anglophone audiences.

His Works

Both these friends collaborated on some of the most memorable books including Is Paris Burning? (1965), Or I’ll Dress You in Mourning (1968), O Jerusalem (1972), Freedom at Midnight (1975) The Fifth Horseman (1980), and a thriller Is New York Burning? (2005). These books were sold in millions, in more than 30 languages.

In 1985, he wrote the novel The City of Joy, based on the story of a rickshaw-puller and an American doctor who was in search of enlightenment. It proved a huge success.

His twenty thousand miles of adventure, beginning with just 30 dollars in his pocket in 1949, led to his first book A Dollar for a Thousand Kilometres which became one of the best sellers of post-war France and other European countries.

Lapierre, with his wife, founded a humanitarian association, called the City of Joy Foundation. They rescued children suffering from leprosy and from slums of Kolkata. He also donated half of the royalties he earned from the book The City of Joy to support several humanitarian projects in Kolkata, including refugee centres for leper and polio children, dispensaries, schools, rehabilitation workshops, education programmes, sanitary actions, and hospital boats.

His book Five Past Midnight in Bhopal, based on the 1984 Bhopal Gas Tragedy, was published in 1987, and the English edition was published in 2001. The royalties from this book were given to the Sambhavna Trust Clinic in Bhopal, which provides free medical treatment to the victims of the gas tragedy.

Awards

Lapierre was awarded India’s third highest civilian award, the Padma Bhushan, as part of the 2008 Republic Day honours list.

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