Zápisky z vězení (2026)

This Czech-language book contains the prison notes of former French president Nicolas Sarkozy, whose arrest caused an international stir and rewrote history. “There is nothing to see or do in prison. On the other hand, there is much to hear, because silence does not exist in La Santé prison. The noise there is unfortunately constant. In prison, as in the desert, inner life grows stronger.” Sarkozy, who served as French president from 2007 to 2012, was sentenced in autumn 2025 to five years in prison for criminal conspiracy. He was allegedly involved in approaching people close to Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi and arranging financing for his presidential campaign, which he has always strongly denied. For the first time in the history of the European Union, the head of a member state found himself behind bars. Despite appealing the verdict, he spent three weeks in prison, during which he wrote. In his notes, he describes his stay at the Paris prison La Santé, where General Alfred Dreyfus was once also imprisoned. He returns to the trial that preceded his imprisonment and to recent conversations with President Emmanuel Macron, Marine Le Pen and other leading figures in contemporary French politics. He reflects on his political career, the current state of French politics and the justice system, which, in his view, judges him not “for what he did, but for who he is”. The book’s publication became an event in France, selling around 200,000 copies in its first month.