The Sawyer's Helper is a story immersed in the trial of Valentin Marcon, author of a double murder in a sawmill in Les Plantiers, by Bernard Déliane from Nîmes.
The sawyer's helper, by Bernard Déliane published by Numéro7 (Photo Anthony Maurin)
Valentin Marcone, 32, appeared last year before the Gard Assize Court for a double murder. A media trial for a news item that held the whole of France in suspense for almost four days in May 2021.
Do you remember it? The Gardois are marked by this affair and the Cévenols even more. Bernard Déliane lives in Nîmes, knows the region and takes advantage of his retirement to write. After a first work signifying his past close to ETA, here he is with a much more local subject and detached from him. Finally… Psychiatric nurse then service manager, he worked for thirty-five years in psychiatry. Suffice to say that his expertise on the trial of Valentin Marcone is more than interesting.
Having attended the entire trial, he wanted to write a book. Bernard Déliane is also editor-in-chief of the cultural magazine OH!lala, he knows how to draw you in with paragraphs that he gently brings to life. However, and on this morning of May 11, 2021, nothing was sweet in the heart of the small sawmill in Plantiers, a village in the Cévennes.
Valentin Marcone, his wife and his daughter • Photo DR
It is Jacques Olivier Durand who recalls the scene, at the back of the book The sawyer's helper which you will find at Name7.
May 11, 2021, “The double murder of Plantiers”, widely reported by the national press, has a profound impact not only among the Cévennes and Gard population but throughout France. Two years and eight months later, the trial of Valentin Marcone is held at the Nîmes court. Bernard Déliane attends it in its entirety. The story he gives us is not a journalistic audience report that would claim objectivity and completeness, but a subjective immersion, concerned with precision, very largely informed by his professional career in the universe of psychiatry.
This is one of the originalities of his work which attempts to understand in depth what could have led Valentin Marcone to take action. How did this calm and composed young man fall into unpredictable brutality? In concise and precise writing, he helps us understand what could have led “the Plantiers sawyer help to lose his temper”? How do we analyze a delusion? How do we explore the complex world of paranoia?
-Bernard Déliane's sawyer helper at Numéro7 (Photo Anthony Maurin)
A verdict only reveals part of the truth. The informed and personal reading that Bernard Déliane delivers gives us new keys to better approach it. But the author of the book also leaves us some notes to better understand his approach to detailing such a trial.
« The following text is not an investigative work on a legal case. It is the story immersed in a trial exposed in its subjectivity. I followed the public hearing in its entirety, with the exception of the legally secret deliberation. »
All people and situations mentioned in this text exist or have existed. Everything is linked to what made this story news. The trial was open to the public. “ We are not in fiction. But this narration, like all written stories, is written by a unique person and is the fruit above all of his interpretation. I reread my audience notes, reconstructed memories, recognized their sometimes approximate nature, searched for press articles, photos and television reports, took up annotations and wrote comments based on my readings – a small step aside -, in order to report on this affair, with a certain coherence I hope, in the most subjective way possible. I relate the way in which I experienced from the inside, but with my exteriority, a hearing leading to the judgment of a highly publicized case. »
Valentin Marcone, alleged shooter of Plantiers. (Photo DR)
You might wonder, how did it get there? He could talk about chance or, on the contrary, that everything was written in advance and that he wasn't there for nothing. “ I leave you to your questions. Just know that my own steps brought me there and that it is not the consequence of an alignment of the planets. I have always loved solitary walking. Many centuries ago, certain Taoist thinkers defined the ideal walk as one where you do not know where you are going. This way of looking at walking guided the writing of this book. »
The author, Bernard Déliane, will be signing on January 24 at Gard Ô Vin, one year and one day after the start of the trial, at the same time as the opening of the Biography festival.
Sawyer help from Numéro7 editions. Square glued spine in 148 x 210cm format with 122 pages. Published in November 2024.
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