She is giving another lesson in bravery and serenity by recounting in her memoirs the rapes of her ex-husband, Dominique, the man she trusted, with whom she built a family and who, for decades, drugged her to rape her himself and to offer her to at least fifty other attackers.
The book, which is published in Spanish under the title A hymn to life: My storywill be published next Tuesday, February 17, in 22 languages. In Spanish you can find it in the Lumen publishing house. “I looked like a rag doll,” explains the septuagenarian when remembering the first time she saw herself under chemical submission in the videos that the Police showed her at the police station. “The cop dropped a number. Fifty-three men allegedly came to our house to rape me.” There was the other shock, knowing that not only did her husband abuse her, but that .
The story of the rapes she suffered at the hands of her ex-husband went around the world and made her a leading figure in the fight against sexual violence, especially because she decided that the trial would be public, with her testimony and attendance uncovered, in an attempt, as she defended, for “shame to change sides”, from the victims to the rapists. Now, Pelicot publishes his life memories, ranging from his meeting with Dominique to his life after the trials.
Gisèle reveals her story under the pen of the journalist and writer. The first extracts from the book were published on Tuesday in the newspaper . The victim, in the legal sense, but not in life, as she points out in the newspaper’s columns, takes up her story without asking the reader to feel pity, compassion or admiration for her, just as she did during her trial for rape.
It all started with a phone call and an appointment at the Carpentras police station (Vaucluse), on the morning of November 2, 2020, which he will not forget. A police officer interrogated her and then showed her photos of herself sleeping and being raped by unknown people. Gisèle Pelicot did not recognize herself then either.
“The cheeks were so flabby, the mouth was so soft, that it looked like a rag doll,” he describes, ensuring that his brain stopped in the office of the second lieutenant, surnamed Perret, and to whom he shows all his gratitude for his work and his sensitivity in the case.
“The cheeks were so flabby, the mouth was so soft, that it looked like a rag doll.”
In her first interview on television, regarding the promotion of the book, the lady delves into that moment. “I don’t recognize myself in those photos. I said: ‘That’s not me (…) Then I put on my glasses and there I discovered this lifeless woman with a man she doesn’t know in her bed. I think my brain dissociated,” he said in .
At the end of the investigation, she tells how stunned she was when she read the details of what happened. “The dates hurt me. I kept seeing the moment before, the moment after, where we were, what we were experiencing and what I thought was a happy moment. It was my birthday, it was New Year’s Eve that we had spent alone for once, it was just after our children had left,” he explains.
Warning signs
The woman suffered for years from strange gynecological problems that doctors could not explain, and which were due to the constant abuse to which she was being subjected. Now, looking back, he believes there were warning signs, but at the time he didn’t allow himself to face them.
She remembers noticing a yellow stain on a pair of pants shortly after she and Dominique Pelicot moved to the southern town of Mazan. “I asked him if I could be taking drugs, and then he started crying. Could it be my subconscious? I don’t know.”
Another incident involved a pale beer, which appeared to change color after Dominique Pelicot added what he claimed to be mint syrup. When she questioned him, he dumped the contents down the sink. “At the time I didn’t think anything about it.”
Gisèle Pelicot, in front of a mural dedicated to her as she exits the court, in an archive image.
“If I had been 20 years younger…”
Then came the trial. In 2024, Gisèle Pelicot decided to refuse to go to trial behind closed doors, which would have left her alone to face her 50 attackers, her ex-husband and their lawyers. For fear of protecting them, she explained, but also of facing them alone.
“I couldn’t wait to see them face to face. I was afraid because of their high number,” he recalls. “So much so that, more and more, the closed door of the room, which had to protect me from the gazes, the press and the comments, worried me. I felt like I had to face all of them alone.”
When she appeared before the Avignon court, she explained that she refused to go behind closed doors “so that all raped women stop feeling ashamed.” He continues to maintain this position, but in his biography he contextualizes this choice. “Today, when I think about the moment I made my decision, I tell myself that if I had been twenty years younger, perhaps I would not have dared to refuse to go behind closed doors,” she explains.
“I would have been afraid of the looks, those annoying looks that a woman of my generation has always had to deal with, those annoying looks that make you hesitate in the morning between pants and dress, that escort you or ignore you, that flatter you and embarrass you, those annoying looks that are supposed to say who you are, what you are worth, and then they drop you when you get older,” she writes.
Grateful for the support
During his seven weeks in court, Pelicot (oddly enough) remembers the “incessant attacks,” but also the fear that was disappearing. And the crowd, during the four days of hearings at the Gard Court of First Instance, Gisèle was applauded at every step.
“I had been fleeing for four years from the strong hugs of the people who love me, I didn’t want anyone’s compassion, I only had my own strength, and without a doubt with oblivion. But this crowd was tired of oblivion, of the way in which life cuts us up and leaves us alone, without recognizing our pain. This crowd saved me,” he admits now.
In December, in Avignon, Dominique Pelicot, who organized rapes under chemical submission on his ex-wife for a decade, received the maximum sentence. His co-defendants received sentences ranging from three to 15 years in prison. One of them appealed, but in the end.
Visits his attacker and a new partner
Furthermore, in her television interview, Pelicot states, despite the ordeal she endured, that she still intends to visit her ex-husband in prison as part of her “healing process.” During the trial, she never addressed him directly, she always avoided him. Now she wants to “look him straight in the eyes and ask him, ‘Why did you do that?'”
His vision of 50 years of marriage is complex. Although she describes feelings of betrayal and indignation, she also says that she still wants to hold onto the happy memories, because that’s all she has left of that life.
The interview was an opportunity to address the rifts that have formed within their family since these terrible events came to light. It is wrong, he maintains, to think that “a tragedy unites a family.” Now, his relationship with his daughter Caroline — is slowly being rebuilt, but his son David “needs more time,” he said. “I chose to live with Mr. Pelicot. They did not choose their father, so they are in a different position and I think the path will take longer,” he assumes.
At his age and after the experience, he affirms that he never imagined that he would fall in love again, nor even that he would want to. However, in 2023 she met a man whom she only identifies as Jean-Loup. “Meeting him was incredible,” he says, smiling. “I met this man, who has also gone through difficult times, and he has changed our lives,” he concludes.
