Gisèle Pelicot, the French campaigner who was drugged and raped by her ex-husband and dozens of other men over nearly a decade, has spoken about falling in love again and rebuilding trust. Appearing at the Hay Festival in Wales on Saturday, Pelicot, 73, told the audience she never thought she could trust a man again before meeting her partner, Jean-Loup Agopian.
“It’s something that I didn’t think could happen, especially at my age… I didn’t really want to fall in love, but life decided otherwise,” she said. “You see, you can fall in love at any age, it happened to me, it can happen to you.” Pelicot waived her right to anonymity during the trial of her former husband, Dominique Pelicot, who was jailed for 20 years in 2024 for orchestrating the abuse.
Pelicot also addressed the broader issue of violence against women, saying “society has got to wake up” and that it is an “appalling evil that touches all borders”. She expressed optimism for the future, stating: “I think that we can all live together in harmony, men and women, and it’s a question of educating our children very young.”
She described it as an “absolute miracle” to be speaking on stage, given the severity of the sedation she endured. “The way in which he sedated me… I’m wondering how my heart and my body was able to hold for so long,” she said. Pelicot also revealed that her daughter, Caroline Darian, is pursuing legal action against Dominique Pelicot over images of her unconscious, and praised Darian’s advocacy group M’endors pas, which campaigns against chemical submission.
