He was known as l'homme tranquille – the quiet man – an amiable, if shambling figure who liked to talk, but not about himself, and who was witty, well-meaning, normal and just a little dull. The Socialist Party's eternal backroom boy, doing all the essential, worthy jobs, but keeping resolutely out of the spotlight.
François Hollande's reputation as the perpetual man behind the scenes seemed chiselled in stone, when five years ago Ségolène Royal, pictured right, his partner and mother to his four children, was chosen by party members to challenge Nicolas Sarkozy for the keys to the Elsyée.
She lost. He resigned as party chairman. The couple split. It was assumed she might have another go at the presidency, but equally assumed that the good-natured ever-smiling Hollande would carry on in the shadows.
Then Hollande smartened up his act and dusted off his ambition. Out went the crumpled suits and the old-fashioned horn-rimmed spectacles, the extra kilos and the middle-age spread.
Out, some said, went his much-loved sense of humour and bonhomie, but the Socialists could not have everything. For in came a leaner, meaner, more serious Hollande; a man who could be – and if Sarkozy's disastrous ratings continue will be – president.
The left's Monsieur Ordinary will now be called upon to demonstrate extraordinary leadership skills: first to reunite his party, then, in a more problematic and pressing task, to reunite the fractious French left, before launching his presidential campaign.
He is in a strong position. Successive polls show the French are fed up with Sarkozy after only one term and ready, after 17 years of rightwing presidencies, for a change. A recent poll found 48% of French people believed Hollande could solve the country's economic and financial crisis, compared with 28% for Sarkozy – results that are even more remarkable given that Hollande has never held a government position.
The 57-year-old, who is on the right of the Socialist Party, has always held the right cards to lead France. He studied at the prestigious Institute for Political Studies (Sciences-Po) and then the even more elite École Nationale d'Administration, the hothouse for French civil servants and politicians.
At ENA he met Royal, but he always appeared to be in his glamorous wife's shadow as she was first appointed to a government post under Socialist president François Mitterrand, then made head of a regional council and then nominated presidential candidate. At one point the French nicknamed him Monsieur Royal.
Hollande held the essential, but dull jobs: as a trained lawyer, he sat on the French audit court and was office manager to a former prime minister's press secretary. He served a town council, became a member of parliament, a university lecturer and Socialist Party secretary on economic issues.
In 2002 when a political earthquake saw the Socialist's presidential hope Lionel Jospin knocked out by the far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen, Hollande, then party general secretary, was seen as an uncontroversial, soothing, and safe pair of hands – just what was needed to nurse the wounded and limping party back to health. Even so, few took him seriously.
In 2008 he stood down to make way for a leadership battle between Royal and Martine Aubry, which Aubry won.
Had it not been for the Dominique Strauss-Kahn scandal, Hollande would probably never have emerged from semi-obscurity. Strauss-Kahn was the favourite to win – convincingly – the party's presidential nomination until his arrest in New York in May on charges of the attempted rape of a hotel maid. The charges were later dropped, but. Strauss-Kahn returned to France with his reputation and political dreams in tatters.
Now the presidential race begins, and it promises to be an interesting one, pitting two men with very different personal and political styles against each other. The phrase chalk and cheese springs to mind, or as the French say jour et nuit – day and night.
While Sarkozy's edginess and ego are legendary, Hollande appears grounded and relentlessly cheerful. Sarkozy is charismatic and bling-bling; all flashy watches, Aviator sunglasses and supermodel wife. Hollande is down-to-earth, often self-deprecating, deeply private and lives with a Paris Match journalist.
While Sarkozy is acutely conscious of his height, to the point of avoiding being photographed with taller people during visits, Hollande – just three centimetres above Sarkozy – laughs about his size, saying it makes him difficult to knock over because of his low centre of gravity.
The more that observers analyse the life and career of Hollande, the more Mr Normal he seems. And that may be just what France needs.
