Like Nicolas Sarkozy, I knew I would be a disgraced former president going to prison. Okay, as the once co-president of my hospital’s junior doctors’ mess, perhaps my comparison is a bit grand. And where Sarkozy brought only a few books with him – including Alexandre Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo , perhaps manifesting an early release if his appeal is successful – I was bang to rights for drugs offences, so brought a suitcase full of books into the dock for my inevitable stretch.

Books and prisons have a strained relationship. I regularly get letters from people in prison complaining that their prison won’t let books in for fear of spice adulteration. But I also get requests from governors asking me to bring crates of books in during visits because the state won’t provide the means t

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