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Nicolas Sarkozy will soon publish a personal account next month named Diary of a Prisoner, chronicling the period endured in jail.

The announcement came shortly after the former president left prison while he appeals the guilty verdict related to unlawful coordination connected to efforts to acquire presidential race money provided by the regime of the late Libyan dictator.

Prison Experience: Solitary Musings

“Inside jail one sees little, and nothing to do,” he notes in an extract, implying the account will focus on his thoughts during isolation instead of extensive analysis regarding the strained and struggling jail system in France.

“Quiet is absent, not present at the prison, where there is endless commotion,” he adds. “The din persists relentlessly. However, akin to empty spaces, inner life is fortified in prison.”

Release Hearing: Recounting the Hardship

At his release request hearing, Sarkozy participated via screen from a room in prison, characterizing his incarceration as gruelling. He stated to the judge: “I wish to commend the correctional officers, who are exceptionally humane, and who helped make this ordeal manageable – because it is a nightmare.”

“I never imagined that in my seventies, I would end up incarcerated. It’s a hardship that has been imposed on me. I admit it’s difficult, it’s very hard. It leaves a mark on any prisoner as it’s exhausting.”

First of Its Kind

He, who led the nation for a five-year term, set a precedent as past president in the European Union and the first postwar leader in the French Republic to serve time in prison.

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

Books in Prison

It is not certain whether he had time to go through the volumes he brought with him: a biography of Jesus in two parts together with Dumas’s work the famous story, in which a wrongfully accused individual is sentenced to jail but escapes to take revenge.

Daily Reality

Sarkozy was placed in isolation due to safety concerns in a room approximately nine square meters featuring a personal bathroom in the Paris jail in Paris. Security personnel stayed in an adjacent room.

Sources mentioned that he consumed only yoghurts while inside because he feared prison cuisine could have been tampered with. He had facilities to cook for himself but refused this, as per accounts. It is uncertain if the memoir includes meals during incarceration.

Defense Viewpoint

The legal representative, who visited his client every day during the incarceration, stated during proceedings security would be better released than inside. “There were death threats, listened to yells at night and emergency responses in a neighbouring cell when a prisoner self-harmed.”

Charges and Sentence

Sarkozy went to prison last month when a French court sentenced him to a five-year sentence on conspiracy charges over a scheme to secure campaign funds for his 2007 presidential race.

He disputes the charges and has appealed against the verdict, and another court case planned for the coming spring.