While he was not yet President of the Republic, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing had one day written, in
Le Figaro
, a chronicle in which he did not discuss his political projects, but his literary ambitions.
To be Flaubert or Maupassant, he said in substance, is a far more glorious way of making history than by becoming a deputy or a minister.
In a country where politicians all dream of writing books (even if it means having them written by others), VGE will run until his death after a literary recognition that his entry into the Académie française, in 2004, at the armchair (number 16) by Léopold Sédar Senghor, has never really satisfied.
Rose water
His political works were successful:
French Democracy
in 1976, when he was president in office;
then
Two out of three French people
in 1990;
finally, the three volumes - fascinating, very detailed, very introspective - of his Mémoires,
Le Pouvoir et la Vie
, between 1990 and 2007 (
La Rencontre, L'Affrontement,
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