The book, titled The Great Secret, disclosed that Mitterrand had contracted a fatal cancer in 1981 and that by 1994, though still in office, he was in reality no longer capable of carrying out his...

The book, titled The Great Secret, disclosed that Mitterrand had contracted a fatal cancer in 1981 and that by 1994, though still in office, he was in reality no longer capable of carrying out his duties. When the widow and children went to court in an attempt to preserve Mitterrand’s reputation, a judge initially issued a preliminary injunction that halted all future sales of the book, even though the book had gone on sale the day before and sold 40,000 copies throughout France.