Mesrine: The Life and Death of a Supercrook

by Carey Schofield

Genres: True Crime

Paperback

First published April 24, 1980

Reviews

[Tosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mesrine was probably the closest "real" criminal like Fantomas. Killed a couple of people I believe, also escaped from prison a couple of times, wore various disguises, and robbed banks and stores like crazy.

He also wrote a memoir that is rare and very expensive to buy. In that memoir he claimed he killed more people - which now most people think he made up. Nevertheless he was truly France's late 20th Century popular outlaw. Guy Debord admired him from afar, and his publisher Gerard Lebovici published Mesrine's memoir. Which may have caused him to be murdered - but that's another story.

The British author actually tracked down Mesrine for an interview - and it's a pretty good biography on the man, who was eventually killed in a police ambush.

[xDEAD ENDx · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unfortunately the writing in this book is a little boring, but I was kept interesting by the sheer audacity of Mesrine. He's described as an anarchist in the first few pages, but it isn't until the last few that there's any hint of his "left wing" political sympathies. Despite this, there's not really any explanation of what that means. It's also sort of peculiar that he had such close ties to the OAS, who were integral to so many of his heists and escapes, even after they disbanded.