Henri Charrière called "Papillon " for the butterfly tattoo on his chest was convicted in Paris in 1931 of a murder he did not commit. Sentenced to life imprisonment in the penal colony of French Guiana he became obsessed with one goal: escape. After planning and executing a series of treacherous yet failed attempts over many years he was eventually sent to the notorious prison Devil's Island a place from which no one had ever escaped . . . until Papillon. His flight to freedom remains one of the most incredible feats of human cunning will and endurance ever undertaken. Charrière's astonishing autobiography Papillon was published in France to instant acclaim in 1968 more than twenty years after his final escape. Since then it has become a treasured classic -- the gripping shocking ultimately uplifting odyssey of an innocent man who simply would not be defeated.
