As much a philanthropist as a successful writer, he had sold, with his “pen brother” Larry Collins, some 50 million copies of their six novels, including “Paris brule-t-il?”.
Dominique Lapierre, a French writer passionate about India and who sold some 50 million copies with his American “pen brother” Larry Collins died at the age of 91 on the Côte d’Azur, his widow announced on Sunday in the daily. regional Was-Matin.
“At 91, he died of old age”, explained Dominique Conchon-Lapierre, confident in this interview to be “at peace and serene since Dominique no longer suffers”.
The writer, who lived in Ramatuelle (Var), near Saint-Tropez, for sixty years, had been a resident for a few years in an Ehpad in the town of Sainte-Maxime, according to the newspaper.
Millions of copies sold
After having written, alone, The city of joy (1985), on a slum in Calcutta, he gave a good part of his royalties to the people in misery who had inspired him. The novel has sold millions of copies and was the subject of a film, directed by Roland Joffé, in 1992.
In 2005, he assured that, thanks to his royalties, donations from readers and earnings from conferences delivered around the world, his humanitarian action “had made it possible to cure one million tuberculosis patients in 24 years, to treat 9,000 leprosy children , build 540 drinking water wells and equip four hospital ships on the Ganges delta in India”.
After Is Paris Burning?he had continued his fruitful collaboration with Collins: where you will mourn me (1968, south of the bullfighter El Cordobes), O Jerusalem (1972), Tonight freedom (1975, on Indian independence), The Fifth Horseman (1980, fiction around an atomic bomb) and the thriller Is New York Burning? (2004).