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The ex-president of France is preparing a memoir next month named A Prisoner’s Diary, detailing his time spent behind bars.

The revelation was made shortly after the former president was released while he appeals the guilty verdict related to unlawful coordination regarding a scheme to secure political financing linked to the regime of former Libyan leader.

Prison Experience: Personal Reflections

“Inside jail there is nothing to see, with little to occupy time,” he notes in a preview, indicating the book centers around his thoughts during seclusion instead of extensive analysis regarding the strained and struggling jail system in France.

“Quiet is absent, which doesn’t exist in La Santé, where noise is endless commotion,” he adds. “The racket persists relentlessly. But, just like the desert, one’s inner world is fortified behind bars.”

Freedom Plea: Sharing the Struggle

At his release request hearing, the former leader had appeared remotely from his cell, characterizing his incarceration as draining. He expressed in court: “I must acknowledge to all the prison staff, who are exceptionally humane, easing this difficult experience tolerable – as it truly is one.”

“I didn’t expect that in my seventies, I’d find myself behind bars. It’s a trial that has been imposed on me. It’s challenging, I acknowledge, deeply straining. It leaves a mark every inmate due to its intensity.”

Historical Context

Sarkozy, who served as France’s president between 2007 and 2012, became the inaugural past president from the EU and the first leader since WWII of France to serve time in prison.

Ahead of his incarceration he had said he intended to spend the period to write a book.

Reading Material

It is not certain whether he had time to go through the volumes he took into prison: a biography of Jesus in two parts and Alexandre Dumas’s novel The Count of Monte Cristo, a plot where a wrongfully accused individual is imprisoned later flees to seek vengeance.

Daily Reality

Sarkozy was held in isolation to protect him in a space roughly 100 square feet featuring a personal bathroom at La Santé prison located in the capital. Two bodyguards occupied a neighbouring cell.

It was stated his diet consisted only yoghurts in prison because he feared prison cuisine might have been spat on. He had facilities for self-catering yet he declined, based on unnamed sources. Not known is if he will detail his dietary choices.

Lawyer’s Statements

The legal representative, who visited his client every day throughout the jail term, told the release hearing he would be safer released compared to inside. “There were threats against his life, listened to yells during nighttime plus rapid actions in an adjacent room as a detainee harmed themselves.”

Legal Proceedings

Sarkozy went to prison in late October after a French court gave him a half-decade term for criminal conspiracy in connection with efforts to acquire political donations for his presidential bid.

He disputes the charges challenging the decision, with a new trial set for the coming spring.