Lapierre donated bulk of his royalties from ‘City of Joy’ for humanitarian tasks in India (File)

Marseille:

Dominique Lapierre, a French writer with a ardour for India and whose novels offered tens of tens of millions of copies, has died, his spouse introduced. “At 91, he died of old age,” Dominique Conchon-Lapierre informed the French newspaper Var-Matin on Sunday. She added that she is “at peace and serene since Dominique is no longer suffering”.

Born on July 30, 1931, in Chatelaillon, Lapierre has offered about 50 million copies of the six books he wrote in collaboration with the American author Larry Collins — essentially the most well-known being “Is Paris Burning?”

The non-fiction ebook printed in 1965 chronicled the occasions main as much as August 1944, when Nazi Germany surrendered management of the French capital, and was tailored for the silver display screen by Francis Ford Coppola and Gore Vidal.

His 1985 novel “City of Joy” — in regards to the hardships of a rickshaw puller in Kolkata — was additionally a large success. A film based mostly on it was launched in 1992, starring Patrick Swayze and directed by Roland Joffe.

Lapierre donated the majority of his royalties from “City of Joy” to help humanitarian tasks in India.

In 2005, he stated that thanks partially to this transfer, in addition to donations from readers, it grew to become “possible to cure a million tuberculosis patients in 24 years (and) to care for 9,000 children with leprosy”.

After “Is Paris Burning?”, he continued his fruitful partnership with Collins.

The duo authored “Or I’ll Dress You in Mourning” (1968), “O Jerusalem” (1972), “Freedom at Midnight” (1975), “The Fifth Horseman” (1980), and the thriller “Is New York Burning?”

For a very long time, Lapierre lived close to Collins in Saint-Tropez, their residences separated by a tennis court docket.

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