Two days before the publication of his book "The man we believed" (Fayard), he decided to reveal the secret pact in a press release to AFP.

"In accordance with his will", then explains Paul Pavlowitch, "I must make the following statement: at the end of 1972, Romain Gary told me that he intended +to write something else under another name+ because – he insisted – + I no longer have the necessary freedom +”.

Six months have passed since the death of Romain Gary, on December 2, 1980, "a suicide à la Hemingway", recalls AFP in its dispatch.

Pavlowitch explains that he "agreed to serve as a + shield +, and + scapegoat + to critics and photographers".

According to the agreement, says AFP, "Romain Gary became + negro + of Pavlowitch, alias Emile Ajar, brilliant writer with a tortured soul".

Under this pseudonym, which still intrigues, Romain Gary will write "Gros-Câlin" (1974), "Life in front of you" (1975, Goncourt prize), "Pseudo" (1976) and "The anguish of King Solomon" (1979 ).

"Neither his publisher, Claude Gallimard, nor that of Emile Ajar, Simone Gallimard, knew who wrote under this name and they will ignore him until his death", then certifies Paul Pavlowitch.

"As far as I was concerned, no one knew my personal civil identity, I gave an interview to establish the character. Then, recognized, I had to give others".

Paul Pavlowtich believes that the death of Romain Gary releases him from his promise to keep the secret.

Why does he reveal the pot of roses to AFP and not to Bernard Pivot, who invited him on July 3 on the set of his literary program "Apostrophes"?

Writer, publisher and journalist Paul Pavlowitch with a Romain Gary mask in Paris on February 1, 2023 © JOEL SAGET / AFP

More than twenty years after the events, he explained to AFP on Wednesday that the publisher Gallimard had to be exonerated.

"I followed the advice of Claude Durand", the boss of Fayard editions, publisher of his book.

He was worried about the reaction of lawyers "who will kill you if you do not write a message to AFP explaining that Romain Gary was the author of the novels by Émile Ajar, which Gallimard editions do not had nothing to do with it, they were white-blue (innocent, editor's note)".

© 2023 AFP