After Back to Lemberg (2016), the Franco-British writer and lawyer Philippe Sands reveals 38, rue de Londona legal thriller which puts in parallel the trajectory of General Augusto Pinochet with that of the former commander SS Walther Rauff.
Why did you choose to deal with this subject and these historic trajectories? What was the starting point for this book and this desire?
38, rue de London is the third part of the “Lviv trilogy”, which started with Back to Lemberg. In many ways, it was a fortuitous beginning, an invitation to give a conference on crimes of crimes against humanity and genocide on which I worked, which turned into a quest for the origins of my grandfather in the city of Lviv (Lemberg). One thing by drawing another, I met the son of Hitler’s lawyer, I was presented to the son of the Nazi governor in Lviv, then I had access to a mine of family documents, including a letter sent from Damascus to Rome in May 1949.
This is how I came across the name of Walther Ruff, SS and Mass murderer, who had fled in southern Chile. Did he know him, Augusto Pinochet, on which I worked in London in 1998? This is how the double survey began which constitutes this book.
What was the work of political, diplomatic, legal and historical research work?
I started my research in 2015, with an interview with the Spanish judge who had asked for the extradition of Augusto Pinochet to Spain, so that he was tried for crimes against humanity and genocide. Have followed dozens of other interviews, on three continents and for many years; Hundreds of hours spent in different archives, looking for dark documents. Then hours and hours to analyze letters, newspapers and books. It is ultimately not so different from the preparation of a case before the International Court of Justice!
I am always the same writing scheme: a first plan of two or three pages, then a year or two to write a first draft, which is for me the most difficult part, then several years to refine, revise, cut and stick, until a narrative arc is taking shape, while continuing my research and my interviews. In this specific case, the real challenge was to tell two stories and find the connection points between them. I was inspired by Mario Vargas Llosa’s model, The party at the goat (2000).
38, rue de London Follows the same style as the two previous books, but differs on an important point: literature plays a central and enlightening role, notably the works of Bruce Chatwin (In Patagonia1977), by Roberto Bolaño (Nights in Chile1997) and Pablo Neruda.
What surprised you the most about your “characters”?
Some of my characters have appalling political opinions, but over the years I have learned to appreciate them on a human level. I also learned how secondary characters – a diplomat or an interpreter – can play a key role in a story, by making a simple phone call at a specific moment, or by observing a gesture or a word of an old dictator.
What did you discover surprising or shocking during the writing of this book?
I really discovered that the concern for detail is essential. The most shocking? I don’t want to say too much, but how can a person who commits a terrible act a year repeating the same horror three decades later?
How are their trajectories linked, ultimately?
This book is a double detective novel. One of the intrigues concerns the relationship between the general and the SS. Did they know each other? Oh yes! Did they work together? You will have to read the book to find out!
What do you hope to trigger at the reader? And what do you hope to teach him?
I take care not to impose my opinions or my conclusions on my readers. This is a lesson that my neighbor and friend taught me, the great spy writer John Le Carré. “Treat your readers with respect, they are intelligent”he said often. I therefore present the problems, the questions and the facts, and I let my readers be their own opinion.
In Back to Lembergit was the difference between the rights of individuals and those of groups. In 38, rue de Londonthe question is whether Pinochet must be extradited to Spain to be tried or sent home to Chile. In short, with this book, I would like my readers to think about what justice and the complexity of its application mean.
Can we say that this book is the fruit of a commitment or a reflection on impunity and immunity?
Impunity can be considered as the absence of justice, and judicial immunity is a means of achieving it. Impunity is at the heart of this work and our time. This is why this word appears in the subtitle. This is surely why the book has already been bought to be adapted to the cinema by Felipe Galvez and Antonia Girardi, who realized The columns (2023). You just have to look around today – in Ukraine and Russia, Israel and Palestine, Sudan, etc. – To understand what I mean.
Is it a book on law or morality?
Law and morality always go hand in hand, just like decency and indecency.
After exploring non-fiction, do you have fictional desires? Maybe writing legal thrillers?
Yes. In fact, I am writing my first novel. The story takes place at the Grand Hotel de Vittel, which served as a Nazi internment camp from 1941 to 1944. It took up a lot of the themes that I addressed in the “Lviv trilogy”, but in a rather French context!