My mother knew Papillon and another one of the characters in the book (Francoise). He was a customer of my uncle's restaurant Il Padrino, in Venezuela, back in the 60's,70's (after this story was told). My brother was just an infant/toddler at this time and they would take turns throwing him in the air, swinging him, etc.. I told this guy Neil about this and he was shocked that my family knew this guy. He had read the book and loved it so much. So as a gift, he gave me a copy of the book.

This book was written in my uncle's other restaurant Il Pappagallo back in the day. What a great story!!!

Henri Charrière recounts his life in prison. Several prisons actually. Even though Charrière's story proceeds that of Leonard Fry I read somewhere that Charrière's recounting of events was not entirely accurate. That same little detail Fry was pinned down to the chair for on Oprah Winfrey's show. I suppose this is a matter of importance for some, but for me, I just want to read their story. In all honestly there were times where Charrière definitely inflated himself.

Charrière breaks out of jail so many times from various island prison's that I was tasting salt water and coconut in my sleep. I had horrid dreams about trying to conceal my own "plan" (a metal tube hidden in the rectum which concealed money). I'm kidding... I did not have such crazy dreams, but I wouldn't have been surprised if I had.

The essence of this book is that Henri Charrière and his gang were good guys who sometimes behaved badly. They had morals and a code by which they lived but life did not deal them a good hand. I'm not sure what else to tell you about this book. It's an adventure with a gang of criminals - plain and simple. It was an entertaining read. Nothing which profoundly changed my life, but I did learn a great deal about French prisons in the 1930's.

Apparently, the publisher of Papillon, Robert Laffont talked Charrière into calling the book an autobiography. Poor Charrière just went along with that idea, so who am I to judge? We all have a great stories to tell. I was entertained by this book, I didn't have any crazy nightmares and I know what to do with a "plan" in the event I ever go to prison.

Tiesiog Robinzonas Kruzas,  lobių sala, jūrų vilkiūkštis, laivo sudužimas, likimo pirštas, kapitono Granto vaikai ir t.t. kartu sudėjus! :D  
Tikra istorija, pranokstanti vaizduotę šimtus kartų. 
Drugeliu vadinamas jaunas drąsuolis  Henri Charriere nuteistas iki gyvos galvos kalėti Prancūzijos Gvianoje. Jausdamasis nekaltas, visas jėgas atiduoda išsivadavimui iš nelaisvės, ir kadangi išmonės ir sumanumo jam netrūksta, prasideda nutrūktgalviški, neįtikėtini, kvapą gniaužiantys nuotykiai, lydimi permainingos sėkmės.
 Žavėjausi Drugelio atkaklumu, sugebėjimu neprarasti vilties, o labiausiai- ištverme ir optimizmu. 
Šią knygą galima būtų pavadinti vyriška-  veiksmas, kovos, klajonės, jūra,džiunglės, salos, pavojai, nuotykiai, visko čia yra. Ir mylimųjų, su kuriomis, mano supratimu, elgėsi ne taip jau ir garbingai- trūkumėlis teisingumo ir sąžinės šarvuose.
Taip pat yra sukurtas filmas.

كنت مفكراها ادب سجون من النوع اللي مش بحبه لكن طلعت بعيدة تماما هي من نوع السعي للحرية بكل الاشكال مهما تطلب حتى لو عمل المستحيل .
ولان دي تجربة شخصية للكاتب وقطع نفسي معاه ف رحلته وجريه من هنا لهنا لهناك في ٧٠٠ بيدج الا انها تستحق فعلا برغم فصول فالنص كانت مملة لكن التجربة كانت جميلة وحبيته

شكرً لداليا رفيقة القراءة
وشكرا لشهاب خلاني اجيبها من معرض ٢٠٢٠

Henri Charrière (aka Papillon - for the butterfly tattoo on his chest)

Papillon is the autobiography of Henri Charrière, a petty criminal convicted of murder (a crime he denied committing) and sentenced to a life of imprisonment in French Guiana in 1931. The book describes the brutal living conditions Charrière experienced in the penal colony as well as his numerous attempts to escape (an endeavor, which ultimately succeeded in 1944).

Questions have been raised as to the accuracy of the book with the general consensus being that a number of the events were true, but that they probably happened to other inmates and that Charrière subsequently attributed them to himself. So, rather than an autobiography, the book is probably best thought of as ‘based on true events’.

As to the book itself … it’s compelling, though in reading it I had trouble believing all of it was factual. I’d also say it was somewhat too long. With that said, it was worth reading.

What is certainly true is the harsh treatment that prisoners received in the French penal colonies. Violence and deprivation was commonplace, as were tropical diseases. Few detainees survived to return to France to describe the horrors they experienced. In 1953, the prison system was finally closed entirely and now serves as a tourist attraction.

پاپیون روایت حقیقی و هنرمندانه زندان و آزادی ست که به سبکی منحصر به فرد نوشته شده،در صفحات پاپیون همراه می شویم با انسان هایی که برای فرار از اسارتی مرگبار می‌کوشند..آزادی ای که بار ها به شکست می انجامد و سیزیف وار بار دیگر خود را در چنگال میله ها و دیوار ها می یابند..




"اکنون که آزادی خود را بازیافته ایم،بر روی این دریای بیکران،سفر بزرگ خویش را آغاز کرده ایم..."
در جهان امروز در اسارت به سر میبریم، اسارتی که زندانبان متعهد و وظیفه شناسی دارد..خودمان‌‌...ما اسیر زنجیر افکار و ذهن خود ایم..افسوس که گسستن از این همه که ساخته ماست آسان نیست..تغییر آسان نیست،همچنان که نمیتوان روح پرنده ای که در قفس زیسته آزاد نمود ما نیز از خود رهایی نداریم..به روز های طلایی ای می اندیشم که در ذهن خود زندگی کردن آن ها را میخواهم..چه دور اند..میگویند که اینده نیامده ست و گذشته از دست رفته و تنها زمان اکنون را در دست داری..اری زمان را در دست دارم،اما افسوس که دیگر خود در دسترس نیستم.

Absolutely fantastic read, what this man goes through is unbelievable.
Honestly gets you from the 1st page and never let’s go.

Rating: 2.5/5, Meh, it was average

Pretty amazing book by Charriere; basically his 'adventures' and escapes from various French penal colonies in French Guiana. Henri Charriere, known in the underworld as Papillon (butterfly, due to a tattoo on his chest) basically cracked safes for a living, but ended up being framed for murdering a pimp and was sentenced to hard labor for life in the late 1920s.

The prose is rather amateurish but full of heart to say the least. After a few years kicking around some truly grim French prisons, Papillon gets shipped to French Guiana, which seems to consist of several penal colonies, each one a horror. Hard to believe that such conditions still existed even in the 1930s! Papillon has one overarching desire-- escape and starting a new life. Escape means going by sea to somewhere else-- a 'cavale' in the lingo-- and hence one needs to first leave the prison and then find a seaworthy boat. The problem is the British colonies will only allow French escapees to stay (say in Trinidad) for a few weeks. The Dutch give the escapees back to the French, as due the Venezuelans (although they work them hard for a few years first!). Papillon (or Papi) dreams of going to Costa Rica, or perhaps Honduras, but dreams and reality alas often clash.

The depiction of the prisons resembles something from the middle ages. Papi ended up spending one stint of 3 years in solitary in a French prison there (punishment for his first escape). Speaking was not allowed and the prisoners never left their cells the entire time. Many suicided, went mad or simply died, and Papi depicts in some detail how he kept himself sane. Other prisons were even worse. Papi's first escape eventually led him to Colombia, where he was arrested (no papers) and lived in a cell which partially flooded on each high tide, bringing in biting crabs, huge poisonous centipedes and other vermin; after a few weeks there, he emerged covered in bites and seriously ill.

On the one hand, this is a tour of prisons in Northern Latin America circa the 1930s and 40s, but on the other, a striking adventure novel chronicling Papi's cavales. All in all, he tried escaping something like 10 times, but only made it twice. The first cavale took him first to the mainland of Guiana, then to Trinidad and Columbia, where he lived for half a year with an indigenous tribe before being captured. The second cavale took place in 1941 where he left a French penal colony on a raft of coconuts in bags and fought the sea for days before the mainland. The details of mere survival are amazing. Imagine being in a small boat baking in the sun, battered by hurricanes, little food or water for weeks at a time. The man had brass balls for sure!

Since he survived to write his 'memoirs' in 1967, you knew he eventually earned his freedom, but the adventures along the way are priceless, as are his (albeit rather sophomoric at times) reflections on civilization and the human condition. I did not really expect this to be such a page turner and was pleasantly surprised. Good stuff! 4 Papillons!!

Filmi kitaptan daha çok sevdim, Steve McQueen ve Dustin Hoffman'ın mükemmel oyunculuğunun etkisiyle sanırım.

I finished this yesterday morning and I don't think I've read a book quite like it before. When it came out in the English translation in 1970, it sold a lot of copies, already having been very popular in France when it came out in 1969, and you can see why it was so big a hit. Henri Charriere, the author of the book, is the central focus of proceedings, the whole thing being about his time in a penal colony in French Guiana and elsewhere. He is otherwise known as Papillon, because of a butterfly tattoo on his chest (papillon being the French word for butterfly). The action starts off with a court case in France, and with Papillon's wrongful conviction of murder, which carries a long sentence in French Guiana, South America...
Obviously, I'll leave the plot description there, but basically it is a book all about the plucky Frenchman's overall sense of injustice, due to his wrongful conviction, and his subsequent determination not to let the system grind him down, and to escape the hell of the French penal colony. You follow Papillon, as he plots and schemes and attempts to escape time after time, and you end up being gripped by his plight and by the awful times he has to endure as a prisoner in steamy South America. There are plenty of interesting characters that he meets along the way also, and there is a real camaraderie between them, forged through their common hatred of the 'screws' who make their life so unbearable most of the time. Papillon's will to overcome his plight is really remarkable, and there is an unrelenting positive attitude displayed by him throughout the book, which permeates the whole thing and makes it a triumph-of-the-spirit type affair, and so ultimately uplifting in many ways...
Occasionally you wonder if absolutely everything happened exactly as he describes, and there are a few details which may be a little odd and fabricated perhaps, but even if most of it is true, it still ends up being a remarkable tale, and a very gripping read, that most people will find enormously engrossing and fascinating right to the last page.

Trois étoiles et demi.

PS: Mon rating concerne l'histoire, et non pas son authenticité. Sachant qu'il s'agit bien d'une biographie romancée dont plusieurs faits réels furent vécus non pas par papillon mais par d'autres personnes, donc, je considère ce récit comme un roman et non pas une biographie.

Henri Charrière, dit papillon, est né en 1906 en Ardèche. En 1925, il rejoint la marine, en 1927, il se fait reformer puis s’installe à Paris, où il vit de petite délinquance. Le 7 avril 1930, papillon est arrêté pour un crime qu’il n’a pas commis, c’est le début de l’aventure.
Papillon entame sa première cavale quarante-deux jours après son arrivée en Guyane Française, il fera plus de deux-milles cinq-cents kilomètres jusqu’en Colombie et vivra en paix un certain temps entre les indiens de Guajira. Consumé par sa vengeance, il quitte son havre de paix en route vers le Honduras Britannique, pays où les évadés bagnards ne sont pas extradés vers la France. Mais son plan échoue, et papillon encore une fois se retrouve au bagne, là, il sera envoyé aux Iles du Salut, où il sera condamné à la réclusion à l’ile de Saint-Joseph. Sa bonne conduite ainsi qu’un geste héroïque lui valent le retour à Royale. Ne pouvant pas s’échapper, il demande à être envoyé sur l’ile du diable qui sera le point de départ de sa dernière cavale.
Au fur at à mesure des cavales, on visite plein de paysages, faisant la connaissance de plein de gens qui, parfois, son tellement bons, qu’on se demande si papillon n’est pas en train de nous mener en bateau. Il est vrai qu’il en a vu papillon, mais le truc qui m’a le plus dérangé, c’est le surplus d’héroïsme, papillon est le plus habile, le plus intelligent, le plus rusé, certes, avec une volonté et une détermination pareille, on devient inventifs et on est prêt à parer tous les coups mais sans beaucoup trop exagérer quand même.
Les points qui m’ont le plus frappé sont l’indifférence des autorités françaises ou internationales à la souffrance des inculpés, la façon inhumaine de les traiter, isolement, réclusion, cachots, mais surtout la persévérance et la pertinence de certains prisonniers à quitter ces conditions ainsi que leurs misères et à regagner coûte que coûte leur liberté.
Ce fut une longue lecture, certains chapitres étaient si captivants, que je veillais sans problème, mais d’autres étaient si longs et dépourvus d’actions, que j’avais envie d’abandonner à chaque fois.
L’histoire est géniale, on est à fond avec les prisonniers mal traités, on commence même à haïr certains administrateurs et à aimer d’autres, on s’impatiente lorsque les préparations des cavales traînent et on prie dieu pour que la suivante soit la bonne.