Pierre Desproges: Fonds de tiroir (1990)

Fonds de tiroir is a posthumous publication, findings of his humorous writings collected and put into a vague alphabetical order. The quotation on the back cover illustrates the nature of the content: 'Il n'est pas vrai que je ne respecte rien : j'ai le plus profond respect pour le mépris que j'ai des hommes': ('It's untrue that I have no respect for anything: I've the deepest respect for the contempt that I have for men.')

There's some funny material here, some mediocre, and unfortunately some that seems to be merely filling space, sort of, er, scraping the barrel. Ironically, though, the best part of this book I found in the Preface, in which his friend Renaud says that he initiated the comedian into fishing, whereas the comedian initiated the singer into golf – although he's not about to write anything like 'I was a mate of Desproges, blablabla, and the proof: we shared the same holes!'

In Père-Lachaise, the tomb of Pierre Desproges (1939–88).