Dominique Lapierre

Dominique Lapierre was born in Châtelaillon-Plage in western France, the son of a diplomat. Working as a roving foreign correspondent for Paris Match in the 1950s and 1960s, he formed a legendary transatlantic writing partnership with American journalist Larry Collins. Together, they conducted exhaustive archival research to write dramatic, cinematic narrative histories that sold tens of millions of copies worldwide, including Is Paris Burning? (1965), O Jerusalem! (1972), and Freedom at Midnight (1975) chronicling the partition of India.

Visiting Kolkata in the early 1980s, Lapierre was deeply transformed by Mother Teresa and the resilience of the poorest slum dwellers of Anand Nagar. In 1985, he published City of Joy, which sold over ten million copies and was made into a 1992 film starring Patrick Swayze. Lapierre donated half of all royalties to establish humanitarian foundation Action pour les Enfants des Lépreux de Calcutta, funding schools, medical dispensaries, and floating boat-hospitals across the Ganges Delta for four decades. He received India's Padma Bhushan in 2008.