Le Camp des saints

This copy is enriched with:

• an autograph card signed by André Malraux to Jean Raspail (1 card, 135 x 90 mm, headed “André Malraux,” written in blue ballpoint pen): “Je vous prie de croire, Monsieur, à mon vif intérêt pour ‘Le Camp des Saints’, et de recevoir mes remerciements pour avoir eu l’attention de me l’envoyer. A. M.”

• an autograph card signed by François Mitterrand to Jean Raspail (1 card, 150 x 105 mm, headed “Le Président de la République,” typescript, signed in blue ink): “Cher Monsieur, J’ai été très sensible à l’envoi que vous avez bien voulu me faire de votre livre ‘Le camp de Saints’ que je lirai, soyez-en sûr, avec beaucoup d’intérêt et peut-être mon opinion rejoindra-t-elle celle de mes illustres contemporains… Je vous en remercie et vous prie de croire, Cher Monsieur, à l’expression de mes meilleurs sentiments. François Mitterrand.”

“Le Camp des saints. A grave subject, and a great one, if ever there was one […] Readers will either embrace or reject Jean Raspail’s point of view. At the very least, it will be discussed, and passionately so. What he says is too important not to be heard, not to unsettle […] So that you may judge for yourselves, we are sending you today, a month in advance, a copy of Le Camp des Saints. Read this book and tell us, whatever your opinion, whether we are right to believe in it as we do” (from the accompanying trade prospectus addressed to booksellers, signed by Jacques Peuchmard, literary director at Robert Laffont).

The camp of the clear-sighted against that of idealists blind to “migratory submersion”? “This book was born strangely,” the author explained in an interview with Le Point on 29 September 2015. “I was in the south of France, one day in 1972, at my wife’s aunt’s house near Saint-Raphaël, in Vallauris. I had a desk with a view of the sea, and I thought: ‘What if they come?’ At first this ‘they’ was undefined. Then I imagined the Third World rushing into this blessed country that is France. It’s a strange book. It took a long time to write, but it came by itself. I would stop in the evening and pick it up again the next morning without knowing where I was going. There is an inspiration in this book that is foreign to me. I won’t say it’s divine, but it is strange.”

Reviled by some as a prophetic breviary, praised by others, this novel resonates strongly with contemporary events: “At first, Le Camp des saints did not sell. For at least five or six years it stagnated. It sold poorly. After three years, sales began to rise. Success came by word of mouth and thanks to the promotion given it by right-wing writers. Until the day in 2001 when a boat of Kurdish refugees ran aground at Boulouris, near Saint-Raphaël, just a few meters from the desk where I wrote the novel! This caused a huge stir in the region. As a result, people started talking about my book again, and it reached a wide audience. I feel a little ashamed, because whenever there is a major wave of migrants, the book gets reprinted. It is consubstantial with what is happening.”

This copy is in the rare first printing of December 1972, with its dust jacket as issued.