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Happy New Year!
1/1/03 – To celebrate the new year, I've added a new feature! There's an addition and a change to the site index lines at the top and bottom of this and most pages to access it. (Please let me know if you find any that weren't changed.)
 Now there's a new index location, Plots, where links to short plot summaries for each of the novels and stories can be found. (And for this page, a new linking name, Forum, for what had been previously Bulletin. For me, at least, this one may take a little getting used to.)
As for the plot summaries, please feel free to send me corrections and suggestions, including notice of minor typos. There's a lot of material, and though I've gone over it before posting it, it's from some years ago, and I keep finding minor errors myself, so I'm sure it needs polishing.
Have a good one!
Steve
(For those of you who think I'm a day early with my New Year's greetings, in a way you're right, since these pages are prepared in Tokyo, and we get the new year a little earlier here than most of the world. But I'll be making a big move in about a month, back to Honolulu after all these years, and then those dates should line up a little better. On the down side, I expect there to be a period of three weeks or so when the Forum won't be regularly updated until I get set up again in mid-Pacific. Please bear with me.)
Simenon Again
1/1/03 – [LEI: Liège, December 21] For the Simenon centenary in 2003, in addition to special walks, Madame Maigret menus, a Josephine Baker and Simenon musical, on February 14, an Inspector Maigret square will be dedicated to the author's most famous character behind the Liège city hall and opposite his birthplace in Rue Léopold. We shall return to the Simenon theme throughout the year. It was interesting to read recently (Parick Marnham, NYRB, 19.12.02) that the great English specialist in French history the late Richard Cobb used the world of Georges Simenon in his periodization of French 20th century history. Taking the Stavisky affair in February 1934 as the dividing line, separating the years of light, the vision of René Clair, from the defeated world of Georges Simenon. Please read issue #32 under 'Maigret and Tootsy'. The Simenon press conference also provided an opportunity for Het Belang van Limburg to distribute a Simenon novel with a Limburg flavor. The House on the Canal that has already been serialized in the paper deals with a family drama in Neeroeteren and also reveals that, in his great-grandparents' generation, Simenon had family members who came from Herzogenrath, Schin op Geul, Neeroeten and Liège – which really was his home town.
www.simenon2003.be
Emile Budé
Maigret's Boyhood Friend
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1/1/03 – The plot description is fine... I just want to make a note about some irony in Maigret's Boyhood Friend. There is a saying "doing right things for wrong reasons". Something like that happened here. Maigret started the investigation based on a lie by Florentin (that the killer spent 15 min. in apartment after the shots) but the conclusion made by Maigret from this false information (killer was looking for letters) turned out to be correct.
Regards,
Vladimir
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Madame Maigret's Four Sisters
1/3/03 – While visiting a Japanese Maigret site recently, Paris du Commissaire Maigret, I noticed a page investigating Maigret's sister-in-law, Hortense.
Hortense? Was Mme M's sister named Hortense?
 There was the reference, right at the end of Chapter 6 of Maigret Takes a Room [Maigret en meublé] (MEU). Mme M had been called to Alsace two days before, to take care of her sister, who was to have an operation. Now she called with her plans: "Listen. Hortense is much better and I might possibly get home in two days..."
Hortense.
I knew David Drake's opinion, for he'd written in a draft edition of his Maigret Biography that "the Maigrets only had one close relative, Louise's sister, Elise Leonard Lauer. She and her husband, Charles Lauer, regularly visit the Maigrets in Paris, and Louise, sometimes with Jules, annually visited the Lauers in Alsace."
Elise Leonard Lauer. Since nowhere in the Maigret Chronicles is Mme M's sister referred to by her full name like that, let's see how Dave must have worked it out. The Leonard is easy. Maigret's Memoirs tell us how M met Louise Leonard, who was to become his wife, and although there's no mention of a sister in that volume, it follows that her sister's maiden name would also be Leonard. How about Lauer?
continued at Mme M's Four Sisters.
ST
Maigret's Paris
1/4/03 – Jérôme Devémy has sent season's greetings in the form of these three postcards showing Maigret-era Paris. (The postcards are new; the images are old.)
Collection Photothèque des Jeunes Parisiens
"Association Soleil" Club de Prévention
2, Place Rutebeuf - 75012 Paris - Tél.: 01.43.41.95.90
TIRAGE LIMITÉ À 2000 EXEMPLAIRES - Reproduction Interdite
Les deux "hirondelles", 1936
Two bicycle-riding policemen, 1936
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REPRODUCTION INTERDITE - TIRAGE LIMITÉ À 1000 EXEMPLAIRES
Les Halles au temps des Halles, Paris 1954
Les Halles at market time, Paris 1954
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REPRODUCTION INTERDITE - TIRAGE LIMITÉ À 1000 EXEMPLAIRES
Autobus à plate-form, 1969
Platform bus, 1969
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Thanks, Jerome! New to Maigret
1/5/03 – Hello, and thanks for the Maigret website. I'm a new Maigret reader, and was looking for a bibliography to check off the volumes I've managed to acquire. Your site came up as the third link (and the first in English!) on a Google search for "Georges Simenon." There is an almost overwhelming amount of information and detail, much of which I'll probably never use, since I am a casual reader rather than a scholar. But it's nice to know it's there! Ain't the web great?
R. Johnson,
New Mexico
Toshiro Mifune and Takashi Shimura in
Akira Kurosawa's Stray Dog. | | Kurosawa film
1/6/03 – Happy New Year!
David Thomson, in an article in yesterday's New York Times, refers to a Kurosawa film, "Stray Dog (1949), a film noir adapted from Simenon." However, Michael E Grost, quoted on this website writes: |
"The film director Akira Kurosawa was a big fan of Simenon, and he reportedly wrote his detective movie Stray Dog (1949) first as a novel, before shooting it as a film. Kurosawa's detectives are policemen, like Maigret, who engage in realistic, ploddingly detailed police work. Like Simenon, and the British realists before him, Kurosawa explores a great many locations, in this case, the poorer districts of Tokyo. The extreme heat, which constantly afflicts the characters, also is present in such Simenon novels as M. Gallet décédé, where it affects his heavily built Maigret perhaps more than it would Kurosawa's athletic star Toshiro Mifune. "
For once the IMdB is not particularly helpful:
Plot Summary for Nora inu (1949) (Stray Dog)
Murukami, a young homicide detective, has his pocket picked on a bus and loses his pistol. Frantic and ashamed, he dashes about trying to recover the weapon without success until taken under the wing of an older and wiser detective, Sato. Together they track the culprit. (Summary written by Jim Beaver {jumblejim@prodigy.net})
Sounds good, but it doesn't sound like any Simenon I've read. Does anyone know the film and whether it's an adaptation or a homage?
Roddy Campbell
An excerpt from Kurosawa's Something like an Autobiography:
| I first wrote the screenplay [for Stray Dog] in the form of a novel. I am fond of the work of Georges Simenon, so I adopted his style of writing novels about social crime. This process took me a little less than six weeks, so I figured that I'd be able to rewrite it as a screenplay in ten days or so. Far from it. It proved to be a far more difficult task than writing a scenario from scratch, and it took me close to two months. |
Four Sisters and Three Nephews
1/6/03 – I enjoyed reading "Mme Maigret's Four Sisters," but I don't agree with the final comment that "Georges was pulling our collective leg" by calling Louise's sister by four different names. As good as Simenon was in creating a generally consistent life for his fictional detective, he was in many respects too driven a writer (or too lazy) to bother to reread his previous stories. It wasn't the number of names for Louise's one sister that bothered me, so much as the three nephews that Inspector Maigret had to rescue. Philippe Lauer in "Maigret Returns," Paulie Vinchon in "Inspector Maigret Deduces" (or "Jeument: 51 Minutes Stop"), and Jerome Lacroix in "Mademoiselle Berthe and Her Lover." But the final straw was calling Louise Henriette, in "Madame Maigret's Admirer"! Simenon wasn't pulling any legs.
Dave Drake
BBC Shop - Maigret: A Man's Head
| 1/8/03 – The recent BBC Maigret plays are now available on cassette at the BBC shop. Four new Radio 4 dramatisations of stories starring Nicholas Le Prevost as Maigret and Julian Barnes as Simenon. The stories featured are Maigret: A Man's Head, Maigret: The Bar on the Seine, My Friend Maigret, Madame Maigret's Own Case. £9.99
Roddy Campbell
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re: Kurosawa's 'Stray Dogs'
1/8/03 – I've seen Kurosawa's 'Stray Dogs' [1/6/03] and it is more of a homage than a direct adaptation. As far as I can remember, the young, inexperienced detective has his gun stolen while he is using public transport. So it is not like 'Maigret's Revolver' where the gun is stolen from Maigret's apartment. (Though he did once have his wallet, including his police badge stolen whilst he was on a bus.) However, it is a moody, atmospheric film with a wonderful use of light, but not a Maigret.
Patricia Clark
Cardiff
Simenon by Simenon
1/9/03 – Thanks to Michel Pitchounet, of Marseilles, who also provided the copy of the Simenon on Screen article, here's another interesting French magazine article on the cinema of Simenon, this one from 1989, shortly after his death. It's a collage of commentary on film by Simenon himself, collected and arranged by the dean of Simenon cinematography, Claude Gauteur.
Here's the French original and my translation:
The collected pieces are from Simenon's dictées: Destinées (1979) and Point-Virgule (1977), an interview by Doringe in Ciné-France (1937) [which appears in full in Cahiers Simeon 1: Simenon et la cinéma], quotes from Maigret himself in Maigret's Memoirs (1951), and an interview (mid '60s) from Bresler's The Mystery of Georges Simenon (1983).
Gauteur has added three convenient charts, Box-Office Simenon, showing the successes of the films, The 10 Cinema Maigrets, and Simenon on the Screen, summarizing respectively the Maigret actors and all the Simenon stories adapted to the big screen. The piece finishes with a series of short reviews of main Maigret actors, and includes a scattering of photos from the films.
I was particularly happy to find the interview from Bresler, since it provides a(n intermediate) source for the unattributed Simenon quote in Haining, criticizing Jean Richard, which troubled Jean-Paul Corlin last October [10/12/02]. Bresler does not say where the quote is from, only that it dates from the mid-60s. (I'd been afraid, after all the Haining-bashing, that it might have been another one of Haining's accidental creations.) Gauteur's article provides a French version of that text.
ST
The worst Maigrets?
 1/11/03 – The section in Gauteur's article from Bresler (above) got me back into his Mystery of Georges Simeneon. Consider these comments on the last Maigrets in Chapter 19, "Death of a Talent" (page numbering from the Beaufort edition):
- p.221. Most informed French critics would agree with the view expressed by Maurice Dubourt that [Simenon's] "last good novel" was Le Chat ("The Cat"), written in October 1966, when he was sixty-three.
- p. 222. Of the eighteen more novels, equally divided between Maigrets and non-Maigrets, that Simenon was to write after Le Chat, none has anything like its stature. ...for the most part they are no better or no worse than any other competent storywriter could have produced.
- p. 228-229. Even his beloved Maigret had lost sparkle for him; the last Maigret novels are clockwork, automatic things with sloppiness in the plotting and a palpable disenchantment on Simenon's part for all the new "gadgetry" of forensic science with which a modern policeman would have to work. When Maigret talks, in Maigret et l'affaire Nahour ("Maigret and the Nahour Case"), written in February 1966, about a "paraffin test that can reveal crusts of powder on the skin up to five days after a shot has been fired", it just does not sound convincing.
- p. 229-230. "One must have the courage to say it, and so much the worse for the faithful who will complain," wrote a reviewer in L'Actualité magazine in December 1970 about one of the last Maigret novels, La folle de Maigret ("Maigret and the Madwoman"), "but Commissioner Maigret does not exist any more. Georges Simeon, worn out by so many books, and today's society, which, like the police itself, functions by computer, has killed him." "The new book by Simenon is not to be classed among his best," wrote Jacques de Ricaumont in the influential Nouvelles Littéraires in October 1972 about Maigret and M. Charles ("Maigret and Monsieur Charles"), which turned out to be the last Maigret — and the last novel — that Simenon ever wrote. "One has the impression that the author is out of breath and that his hero is fading away... This is really a third-rate Maigret." Noelle Loriot in L'Express was no more complimentary. "Here's Simenon's latest book, Maigret et M. Charles, a police thriller so alarmingly bad that one wonders what would have happened to it, if it had been the manuscript of some unknown 'Mr. Smith' who has sent it in to the publishers? Refused for mediocrity, lack of action and feebleness of style? Probably."
Here's the section of the Check List showing the last eleven Maigrets, published after 1966:
| 65. | NAH | Maigret and the Nahour Case ('67) PLOT |
| 66. | VOL | Maigret's Pickpocket ('67) PLOT |
| 67. | VIC | Maigret Takes the Waters, Maigret in Vichy ('68) PLOT |
| 68. | HES | Maigret Hesitates ('68) PLOT |
| 69. | ENF | Maigret's Boyhood Friend ('68) PLOT |
| 70. | TUE | Maigret and the Killer ('69) PLOT |
| 71. | VIN | Maigret and the Wine Merchant ('70) PLOT |
| 72. | FOL | Maigret and the Madwoman ('70) PLOT |
| 73. | SEU | Maigret and the Loner ('71) PLOT |
| 74. | IND | Maigret and the Flea, Maigret and the Informer ('71) PLOT |
| 75. | CHA | Maigret and Monsieur Charles ('72) PLOT |
Although it's true that Maigret and Monsieur Charles is not one of my favorites, I'm afraid I "suffer" from the attitude that "there's no such thing as a bad Maigret," and so it's hard for me to think of this group as notably poor.
How about you? Are these among your least favorite Maigrets? What's your favorite? What would you recommend to someone who'd never read Maigret as the best five to start with?
ST
paraffin tests
1/11/03 – Bresler writes, (above) about "a palpable disenchantment on Simenon's part for all the new "gadgetry" of forensic science with which a modern policeman would have to work. When Maigret talks about a "paraffin test that can reveal crusts of powder on the skin up to five days after a shot has been fired", it just does not sound convincing."
Here's the section from Chapter 6 of Maigret and the Nahour Case (NAH 1967):
'We have one way, Monsieur Fouad, of finding out whether that is what happened, within an hour. I shall ring Moers, one of the best technicians at the records office. If he isn't at the Quai he'll be at home. He will bring the equipment necessary for the paraffin test which we performed on Monsieur Nahour, and we will know whether you used a fire-arm.'
Oueni did not flinch. On the contrary his smile became more ironical than ever.
As Maigret went towards the telephone, he stopped him: 'There's no point.'
'Do you admit it?'
'You know as well as I do, Monsieur Maigret, that the test can reveal crusts of powder on the skin up to five days after a shot has been fired.'
'You are remarkably knowledgeable.'
'On Thursday I went to a shooting-range, as I frequently do, in the basement of a gunsmith called Boutelleau and Sons, in the Rue de Rennes.'
'With your pistol?'
'No. I've got another one, exactly like this one, which I leave there, like most of the customers. So it's quite likely that you'll find crusts of powder on my right hand.'
'Why do you practise shooting?' Maigret was annoyed.
'Because I belong to a tribe which goes armed at every time of the year and which claims to have produced the best shots in the world. Boys use guns after the age of ten.'
Maigret slowly raised his head.
'And what if we don't find any traces of powder on Alvaredo's hand or on Madame Nahour's?'
'Alvaredo came from outdoors where it was twelve degrees below zero. One can assume he was wearing gloves and probably even fairly thick gloves. Didn't you check that?'
He was trying to be insulting.
  I'm not sure what troubles Bresler about that. For one thing, it's not M who talks about it. And actually, paraffin tests had already appeared in at least three Maigrets since 1960: It's a paraffin test that reveals (to M's surprise), that Jaquette Larrieu had fired the gun in Maigret in Society (VIE 1960). It was used again in Chapter 8 of Maigret and the Lazy Burglar (PAR 1961): "The 'paraffin test' had been applied to the four men's hands, so that if any of them had used a firearm of any kind within the past three or four days, gunpowder would be found in the pores of his skin, even if he had taken the precaution of wearing gloves." At the beginning of The Maigret Bides His Time (PAT 1965). M has Moers come in and give a paraffin test to Aline, who tests negative. (Fingerprints appear in this story as well. In Chapter 2, Moers says, "We'll have the photographs and an enlargement of the fingerprints around three o'clock.") The magistrate asks Maigret, "I suppose you consider the paraffin test conclusive, Maigret?" ... "Unless the murderer wore rubber gloves, his hands certainly carry minute traces of powder, which last for two or three days and which the paraffin test always reveals..."
I think, as we saw when considering fingerprints, [11/05/02], that M doesn't actually avoid modern forensic science at all in his investigations. In that same Chapter 2 of Maigret Bides His Time, Moers "ran the vacuum cleaner around just in case, and took away the dust to analyze it." It seems to me that Simenon regularly added these kinds of "realistic" touches to the Maigrets over the years, but they just aren't the key to "his method," and so we tend not to notice them.
ST
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Maigret in German / German Simenon Society
1/11/03 – Oliver Hahn, webmaster for the fine German Maigret Site, Quai des Orfèvres, has sent in the two missing German translation titles for the Maigret Multi-lingual list, making German the only other language besides English for which all 103 titles are listed. (Italian, Spanish and Dutch are only 3 or 4 short.)
He also reports on a new Simenon society in Germany: "The first activities have already begun, for example an 'Inspector Maigret Night' for an adult education center. We are preparing an excursion to Liège and support journalists for the preparation of articles for Simenon's 100th birthday celebration. Next week some of our members will give interviews for radio stations. The construction of a web page is in the works — as soon as we know more we'll let you know the web address."
Best regards,
Susann & Oliver Hahn
Not "the worst Maigrets"
 
1/12/03 – Some of my favorite Maigrets are among those last 11 [1/11/03]. Maigret in Vichy is entirely charming, and gives us the closest look at Madame Maigret. Maigret and the Flea (Maigret et l'indicateur) has the classic confrontation between Maigret and a savvy opponent. And Le Voleur de Maigret is one of the best he ever wrote, in my opinion. Who among his readers has not sought out, in memory or on the ground, that bistro where so much of the action takes place? And the others are at least average in quality — except for Maigret et M. Charles, which I agree is substandard.
Simenon used this period to give us a varied picture of Maigret, examining his relationship with his wife, with his past, with the demands of modern police work, and with his colleagues. It's true, of course, that some of the stories add nothing new — Maigret et le marchand de vin, for instance, feels to me to be the same kind of story as Maigret et la grande perche. But they're still good stories, and for the most part, credible stories within the Maigret canon.
Oz Childs
The Blue Room
1/13/03 – From The Guardian, 11.January 2003:
The Blue Room, by Georges Simenon (Orion, £6.99)
 As the centennial of the birth of the great Belgian crime writer approaches, with celebrations across Europe and the UK in 2003, British publishing is moving into gear. While Penguin will be elevating an initial half-a-dozen Maigret adventures to the pantheon of their Modern Classics imprint, attention is also being focused on the often remarkable non-Maigret novels. The Blue Room, a minor masterpiece of psychological crime-writing, published in 1963, had been out of print for more than 35 years.* A vain, womanising man and a passionate but manipulative woman meet eight times in 11 months in the blue room of the Hotel des Voyageurs, for blissful, hedonistic afternoons of stolen love. But sex and passion have a curious way of transforming themselves when the long-term plans of the lovers fail to coincide. Soon, the hapless Tony is caught in the nightmare of a double murder. Spare, intense and gripping, this is a perfect introduction to the despairing world of Simenon.
Review by Maxim Jakubowski
Roddy Campbell
(*...in the UK, perhaps. Later editions have appeared in the US.)
Georges Simenon - The Pocket Essential Guide
1/13/03 – Scheduled for publication in February, 2003, a 96-page "Pocket Essential Guide" by David Carter. £3.99
The Greatness of Simenon
 Georges Simenon, born 1903 in Liege, Belgium, has suffered from a false reputation, being considered by many as no more than an author of crime fiction and as having been too prolific for his own good. For this reason he has not been given his due by many literary critics. He was however admired and revered by many great writers and artists. Most famously Andre Gide described him as "the greatest of all, the most genuine novelist we have had in literature." His works were praised by people as diverse a Jean Cocteau, T. S. Eliot, Henry Miller, Somerset Maugham and John Le Carre. He also had close relations with the film world, and was friends with Federico Fellini and Jean Renoir, who made the first film of a Simenon novel.
He developed a simple, clear prose style, with which he nevertheless created works of extraordinary psychological perception and provided compelling evocations of milieu and atmosphere. He probed the depths of lust, envy, resentment and lifelong obsession, but revealed without passing judgement.
His own life was as fascinating as his works. He was reputed to have moved house 37 times in his life, and he once claimed in an interview to have made love to 10,000 women. The last 23 years he spent as a recluse, with only one companion, and wrote 21 volumes of memoirs.
"It deals with both the Maigrets and the 'romans durs'. The series consists of short introductions to various themes, writers, film directors etc, so that the scope cannot be broad, but my book contains extensive annotated checklists of both Maigret novels and 'romans durs'."
David Carter
New French Maigret Site
1/13/03 – Bonjour – Un site sur le célèbre raccommodeur de destinée vient de naître : Vous l’aurez compris, il s’agit du personnage le plus célèbre de la littérature policière internationale : le commissaire Maigret.
Cliquez sur
monsite.wanadoo.fr/commissairemaigret
Ce site n’est pas totalement achevé, mais pouvez déjà découvrir Bibliographie important et des liens avec d’autres sites Web. N’hésitez pas à nous rendre visite.
Jean-Paul Corlin
Créateur du site
A new site on the famous mender of destinies. As you no doubt realize, it's about the most famous character of international police literature, Commissaire Maigret. It's still in progress, but there's a significant bibliography and links to other web sites. Please visit!
Late Maigrets
1/14/03 – With regard to your query about what people think of the later Maigrets [1/11/03], I would take your opinion and that of Oz Childs [1/12/03] and other enthusiasts over those of newspaper and magazine critics.
I was not very taken with Bresler's biography. It seemed to me that he was trying too hard to prove a thesis, and his attempt at explaining Marie-Jo's suicide seemed very unconvincing.
For myself, I like the 1950s Maigrets best [see CheckList]. They seem to me to have a greater fluency, invention and sense of atmosphere, but I wouldn't denigrate the others.
Roddy Campbell
New Maigret Website by Guido de Croock!
1/15/03 – I've created a website, Maigret’s journeys in France. As many of you know, I am particularly interested in the locations of the Maigret novels and stories set in France which took place outside of Paris. On this new website I present summaries and extensive location-analysis of these stories.
For the moment only 4 of 33 stories or novels are reviewed. But it is my intention to review the remaining stories progressively. The website is illustrated with lots of photographs, maps, drawings and old postcards. Already reviewed stories are:
In the nearest possible future I will try to visit the different locations. So that the website can be completed with information and photographs of the present-day situation. This new website can be found at: www.maigret-in-france.net. [NB: this site went down in 2006 and has been reconstructed from archives here. ST 7/19/07]
Guido de Croock
Congratulations, Guido! Best of luck with your new site!
The Man on the Eiffel Tower
1/22/03 – The National Film Theatre in London is showing The Man on the Eiffel Tower [La tête d'un homme] on 23 and 25 February as part of its History of Colour season (details at www.bfi.org.uk/nft). The NFT programme booklet for February says: Based on a novel by Georges Simenon, this superb piece of 'continental noir' stars Charles Laughton as Parisian police inspector Maigret, investigating a rich woman's murder, and includes an exciting climactic chase on the Eiffel Tower. It was filmed on location in Paris by top cinematographer Stanley Cortez in the newly available Ansco Color process. Previously shown at the NFT in black and white; restored in 2002 by the UCLA Film and Television Archive from two surviving original prints.
Richard Thomas
...and see John H. Dirckx's comments on this title: [12/3/02]
Penguin reissues
1/23/03 – A little bit of detective work leads me to believe that the Simenons which Penguin will release in the UK in April (don't know about elsewhere, but you'll be able to buy them on the Internet) are as follows:
- Lock 14, trans. Robert Baldick
- Inspector Cadaver, trans. Helen Thompson, intro. Paul Bailey
- The Yellow Dog, trans. Linda Asher, intro. David Vinen
- The Bar on the Seine, trans. David Watson, intro. Michael Dibdin
- My Friend Maigret, trans. Nigel Ryan
- A Man's Head, trans. Geoffrey Sainsbury, intro. Patrick Marnham
In addition, Penguin are republishing Patrick Marnham's biography of Simenon, The Man who wasn't Maigret, in February.
Roddy Campbell
Maigret's Fourth apartment in Paris
1/24/03 – In L'Ecluse No 1 (French version) and in two different books of this story, Maigret was living on the Blvd Edgar-Quinet but the number wasn't mentioned. In The Lock at Charenton (English version of the same story, he's at the Blvd Richard-Lenoir. Edgar-Quinet is near the Gare Montparnasse (station) and some distance from his usual place on R-L. In the course of this story Maigret asked for and received permission for early retitement and was in the middle of moving house to Meung as he was working on his last case. The other two addresses were numbers 8 and 21, Place des Vosges.
In the later Maigret stories, Maigret and the Loner [SEU] is one of my favorites no matter when it was written. I love the murder within the murder that Maigret uncovered as this progressed and how he started from just the corpse and arrived at the double solution. I also have Maigret and Mr. Charles [CHA]. Aside from the fact that Mr. Charles was the nickname of a no-gooder in another story, I noticed that my book did not have the address of Gastinne-Renette in it although he is mentioned. If anyone has this, could they please post it on the Forum?
Joe Richards
In the Tout Simenon [Tome 18] edition of L'écluse n° 1, at the beginning of Chapter 6, "Maigret prit un taxi et arriva quelques minutes plus tard dans son appartement du boulevard Richard-Lenoir." [Maigret took a taxi and arrived a few minutes later at his Blvd. Richard-Lenoir apartment.] Please let us know which French editions the Edgar-Quinet address appears in! Does anyone else have French editions of this they can check?
Gastinne Renette
1/25/03 – Re: Joe Richards' posting (above), a Google search on "Gastinne-Renette; France" generated a link to: Armuriers d'Ile de France, which gives their details as:
Gastinne Renette 01 43 59 77 74
télécopie: 01 42 56 21 11
39 av Franklin D Roosevelt 75008 PARIS
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Best wishes,
Michael Newman
Chelmsford UK
Blvd. Edgar-Quinet
 | 1/25/03 – My edition of L'écluse n° 1 ("Pocket" No. 1353, but includes ads for Presses de la Cité, printed in 1999) has Maigret taking that taxi to the Blvd. Edgar-Quinet [1/24/03]. Threw me for a loop, too. I wonder which came first? My guess is that the original edition had the same mistake, corrected when "Tout Simenon" was published, but I don't have the original edition, needless to say.
Oz Childs |
Blvd. Edgar-Quinet
1/26/03 – I have the story in both Pocket [copyright 1977, Presses de la Cité, 12, Avenue d'Italie. 75627 Paris CEDEX 13. TEL: +31 01 4416 0500. Pocket 1353. No d'imprimer 301. depot legal fevrier 1999. Acheve d'imprimer en fevrier 1999 sur les presses de l'Imprimerie Bussiere a St. Amand (Cher)], and in Œuvres complètes Maigret V, 1967. The text is the same in both:
Chapter 6...
Maigret prit un taxi et arriva quelques minutes plus tard dans son appartement du boulevard Edgar-Quinet.
[Maigret took a taxi, and a few minutes later was at his flat in the Boulevard Edgar-Quinet.]
The chapter ends with this...
—Taxi?
—Oui... Non... Boulevard Edgar-Quinet, il n'y avait personne et la grand lit était parti pour la campagne. Maigret fit comme Ducrau: il alla coucher a l'hotel au bout de la rue St. Honoré.
Sa femme qui était arrivée là-bas, dormait pour la première fois dans leur maison.
["Taxi?"
"Yes— No—" There was no one at the Boulevard Edgar-Quinet, and the big double bed had gone to the country. So Maigret did what Ducrau had done. He spent the night in a hotel on the corner of the rue St.-Honoré.
His wife would have arrived by now, and would be sleeping, for the first time, in their new house.]
This brings up some interesting points. In other stories the Maigrets bought a car before he retired. Given this, why did Madame Maigret take the train to Meung? Also, it's mentioned in several other stories that the Maigrets vacationed or even spent the weekend at their house in Meung. That implies that there was already some furniture there and they had slept there previously. Also, they kept their flat in the boulevard Richard-Lenoir (and also in the Place des Vosges depending on the story). That indicates a need for furniture to remain in Paris.
Also, in different stories, the flat on Richard-Lenoir was rather small but they later bought the other flat on the same floor. In another story a maid's room on the sixth floor was mentioned. To confuse things even more, there were two different businesses across the street in the same place with large premises.
Anyway, I hope this provides some food for thought...
Regards,
Joe Richards
Oh, does anyone know Simenon's addresses in Paris besides
21, Place des Vosges?
The Boulevard Richard-Lenoir Address
 | 1/27/03 –
I have used the number 132 Boulevard Richard-Lenoir from the advertisement Maigret put in the paper in Maigret's Special Murder [MOR] to find the car thieves who had placed the body in the Place de la Concorde.
Dave Drake |
Blvd. Edgar-Quinet
1/28/03 – Guglielmo (Willie) Innocenzi, webmaster of the Italian Simenon site, Georges Simenon, writes that Blvd. Edgar-Quinet [1/24/03] appears "in the original French edition, the Italian first edition of 1934, and in an early Italian edition of 1974." It's also listed as the address on the Japanese Maigret site, Paris du Commissaire Maigret. The earliest English edition I have is the 1941 Jonathan Mystery edition, Maigret Sits it Out, and that, like apparently all the English editions (and the 1991 Tout Simenon edition), shows Blvd. Richard-Lenoir.
L'écluse n° 1 [ECL] was the 18th of the original Fayard Maigrets, written in April, 1933, and published that same year. The Richard-Lenoir address appears in six of the preceding Maigrets, but there is a gap of about a year and a half between the last mention, in L'ombre chinoise [OMB], written in December, 1931, and L'écluse. While that might be long enough for Simenon to have forgotten that he'd been using Richard-Lenoir, those first 18 were more or less written as a series, so we might expect a relatively high degree of internal consistency. (In fact L'écluse was intended to be the final Maigret, but he was brought back for "one more time" in Maigret [Maigret Returns] [MAI], written in January, 1934. The next Maigret novel, Les caves du Majestic [MAJ], was not written until five years later, and published in 1942.) Did the English translator (Margaret Ludwig) make the "correction"?
Another "slip" noted by Willie Innocenzi (and others) is that Maigret gives his name as "Joseph" when asked by Ducrau for his Christian name in Chapter 5. It appears in the English translation as well.
My feeling (shared by numerous critics) it that the early Fayard Maigrets should probably be analysed as a group. I hope to examine in more detail what the Maigret of these 19 pre-war investigations was like, and how he differed in later years...
ST
Another Maigret Reference by Nicolas Freeling
2/1/03 – I think the author, Nicolas Freeling, must be a Maigret fan. "A Long Silence" (first published in 1972) is only the second of his Van der Valk thrillers that I have read and, like "Tsing Boum", which I mentioned in an earlier posting [3/12/02], it too contains a reference to Maigret.
In a book containing notes for his thesis, Van der Valk writes (page 23 of the 2001 House of Stratus paperback edition):
Conclusion, a criminal investigation unit should perhaps consist of no more than four or five men, each with specially sensitised skills. Cf fictional Maigret. Lucas the elderly, careful, good at details, patience, perseverance, Janvier young, ambitious and imaginative, the "little Lapointe", sensitive and idealistic, innocent and kindly, Torrence who is muscles, and Lognon the indefatigable plodder - this is a clever formula, remaining workable for fifty books. Now postulate smallish flexible computer unit, able mechanically to perform all that time-wasting checking. It can give mechanical evaluation, but cannot replace sensitive human understanding, can never replace Maigret!
Not sure where he got the fifty book total from though, given that the last Maigret had already been published by 1972!
Best wishes.
Michael Newman
Chelmsford, UK
Maigret on TV5
2/2/03 – TV5 is available to UK viewers on the Sky platform - Channel 825.
On 8 February 2003 from 2125 to 2305 the channel will be broadcasting a Bruno Cremer "Maigret" - "Maigret et les plaisirs de la nuit", from 1991.
According to the TV5 website - www.TV5.org - this is "Episode 1 of 24".
If you access the website there is a brief "trailer" with stills from the broadcast.
David Lax
More about TV5
2/6/03 – Further to my recent message, I've been flicking through the UK Sky Guide and have discovered that the following are due to be transmitted on satellite TV (channel 825 on UK Sky Digital) shortly.
Saturday 8 February 21:30 - 23:00 GMT - Maigret
(The first of) 24 episodes with Bruno Cremer. Detective series set in 50's France featuring Georges Simenon's pipe-smoking super-sleuth, Superintendent Maigret
Sunday 9 February 21:20 - 23:00 GMT - Picpus
A film by Richard Pottier, with Albert Préjean, André Gabriello, Jean Tissier, Juliette Faber, Edouard Delmont, Colette Régis. Detective film based on a Maigret novel by Georges Simenon. When a woman moves into her new apartment, she discovers a corpse in her wardrobe.
Monday 10 February 21:20 - 23:05 GMT - Le voyageur de la Toussaint
A film by Louis Daquin (1942), with Assia Noris, Jean Desailly, Jules Berry, Gabrielle Dorziat, Louis Seigner. Drama based on a novel by Georges Simenon.. When a young man returns to his parents' home town as the sole heir of his uncle's fortune, he encounters hostility from the locals.
Also, the following is the response I have received from the very helpful Sarah at TV5 to my e-mail:
Please find attached a schedule for the series Maigret starting this Saturday (8th) at 9:30pm, it is a series of 24 episodes and I have given you the schedules for Feb and March, after that the timings should be the same but you can use the website to check in April.
Samedi 21h30 Dimanche 00h05 Lundi 09h15 Mardi 13h30 Mercredi 17h15
Maigret 1/24 08/02/03 09/02/03 10/02/03 11/02/03 12/02/03
Maigret 2/24 15/02/03 16/02/03 17/02/03 18/02/03 19/02/03
Maigret 3/24 Les Césars 23/02/03 24/02/03 25/02/03 26/02/03
Maigret 4/24 01/03/03 02/03/03 03/03/03 04/03/03 05/03/03
Maigret 5/24 08/03/03 09/03/03 10/03/03 11/03/03 12/03/03
Maigret 6/24 15/03/03 16/03/03 17/03/03 18/03/03 19/03/03
Maigret 7/24 22/03/03 23/03/03 24/03/03 25/03/03 26/03/03
Maigret 8/24 29/03/03 30/03/03 31/03/03 01/04/03 02/04/03
The TV5 website - www.tv5.org - is excellent and includes an extensive feature on Simenon, as well as a few links and a competition. Those outside the UK can check out availability in other countries too. Not surprisingly, perhaps, it appears that these programmes are being broadcast as a tribute to Simenon in his centenary year.
Best wishes.
Michael Newman
Chelmsford, UK
Interesting Simenon messages from fr.rec.arts.polar
2/9/03 – Here's a copy of an email from fr.rec.arts.polar on upcoming events related to Simenon. The link is interesting.
From: freeweb@rocketmail.com (E.Borgers)
Newsgroups: fr.rec.arts.polar
Subject: Simenon à profusion...
Date: Sun, 09 Feb 2003 10:21:47 GMT
2003 est le 100ème anniversaire de la naissance de Georges Simenon (13 février 1903), et est célébrée en Belgique francophone comme "année Simenon"..
Il faudra être attentif aux diverses programmations des chaînes TV qui, déjà à partir du 13, présenteront nombre de films tirés de l'oeuvre de Simenon (des "Maigret", mais aussi tirés de ses romans
"durs"). Le cinéma n'a pas toujours bien adapté son oeuvre, mais
quelques films anciens valent la peine: Les Inconnus dans la maison - Le voyageur de la Toussaint - La neige était sale (intéressant, mais reste inférieur à l'exceptionnel roman noir dont il est tiré), notamment. Je suppose que pour les films plus récents, les références vous sont
mieux connues.
En plus des films, il y aura des reprises de documentaires et interviews qui aident à mieux cerner l'oeuvre et Simenon le personnage, personnage complexe, c'est le moins qu'on puisse dire... L'interview de Bernard Pivot en son temps reste par exemple un document intéressant.
Enfin, il y a une nouvelle réédition de son oeuvre complète en cours (chaque volume regroupant plusieurs ouvrages). Et Simenon entre dans
la Pléiade (de Gallimard)...
Il y a un site reprenant le calendrier des événements de "l'année Simenon", à: www.simenon2003.be.
E.Borgers
POLAR NOIR
www.geocities.com/polarnoir
Here is another one, with a link to a French literary newspaper with an article on Simenon.
From: c.lecam.verdier@free.fr (Catherine Le Cam-Verdier)
Newsgroups: fr.rec.arts.polar
Subject: Re: Simenon à profusion...
Date: Sun, 09 Feb 2003 10:53:13 GMT
Dimanche, 09 Feb 2003 10:21:47 GMT, freeweb@rocketmail.com (E.Borgers) a écrit:
2003 est le 100ème anniversaire de la naissance de Georges Simenon (13
février 1903), et est célébrée en Belgique francophone comme "année Simenon"..
Le numéro de février du Magazine littéraire s'intitule "sur les traces
de Simenon". Introduction sur le site de la revue:
www.magazine-litteraire.com
qui offre un article d'archive: Maigret ou la clé des coeurs par
Francis Lacassin (paru dans le Magazine littéraire de décembre 1975):
www.magazine-litteraire.com/archives/ar_417.htm.
Bonne lecture!
Amicalement
--
Cath
Regards,
Jerome
Simenon in Concarneau
2/11/03 – I am doing research on Simenon in Concarneau. Simenon spent the winter 1930-1931 there, and there he wrote "Le pendu de Saint Pholien". Some time later he would write "Le chien jaune" (The yellow dog). Has anyone any information, pictures from his stay?
Jeannine Soullié
Simenon on TV5 / wanted notices
2/11/03 – The forum may like to know that digital TV channel 825 - ie TV5 - has just started to broadcast the odd film based on non-Maigret Simenon (eg Le
Voyageur de la Toussaint) and French TV's Maigret series starring Bruno Cremer. Both are on today 11th Feb. It looks like the Maigret is on on Sats and Weds (maybe Weds repeats Sats). Sorry to be so vague but the TV guide is a bit sketchy as far as the Maigret is concerned.
I'd imagine you don't want the forum cluttered up with wanted notices, but if you were to have a designated swaps/sales/advice on sources of Simenon's novels "day" for "posting" such stuff, it might help some of us to go some way to completing our collections (in my case more of an accumulation) and perhaps we could get to meet fellow fans of your excellent site.
Peter Smith
Hinckley
TV5 is showing the Bruno Cremers and some of the films
2/12/03 – First, thanks so much for this wonderful website. Between the material you have assembled and the many links this is just about anything anyone could possibly want to know about the good Inspector.
TV5, the French network, which is available darned near everywhere in the world on cable or satelllite, is showing quite a few Maigrets beginning this month as part of the centenary. They will be doing all 24 of the Bruno Cremers, starting on Feb. 12 in New York City, and the Albert Prejean "Picpus," as well as a '43 Louis Dacquin film "Le Voyageur de la Toussaint" and a new documentary, "Simenon in America." The films will have English subtitles in the US, I don't know about the documentary.
For more information, people should check out their website. Try
www.tv5.org/TV5Site/programmes/accueil.php and if that doesn't work, just www.tv5.org should.
George Robinson
New York City, NY
Maigret's pipe-smoking habits
2/15/03 – I'm a pipe smoker who just became aware of the character Maigret. What pipes or tobacco did the esteemed inspector enjoy?
Alex Kummel
Maigret et le clochard
2/20/03 – Quite an impressive site you've put up there, wow!
I have discovered your site through a link on the website of "Le Monde" (www.lemonde.fr), just after reading my first Maigret: "Maigret et le clochard" (in a French "Easy Reader" edition). There is just one little detail in your plot summary that differs from what I have read: The name of the Quai where Doc slept before he installed himself under the Pont Marie is Quai de Bercy (not Quai de la Rapée).
Best regards,
Marion Brandl
Thanks
2/19/03 – Thanks, Marion, I'll check where I got that reference once my books, computer and I are reunited. Until then, at least I should be able to once again post notices soon after they're received. And thanks to all the faithful Forum readers who have put up with these few weeks of no postings. That's the reason for the repetitions in some of the above articles - they weren't posted until today due to my move. I've also received some updates to the Norwegian Maigret titles from Nils Nordberg which have not been posted yet...
If you've sent something during the past few weeks and haven't received a response, or it hasn't appeared on the Forum page, please send it to me again.
Ahoha!
Steve
A correction for Chez les Flamands
Simenon Expo in Liege
2/21/03 – The big Simenon expo in Liege opened on Thursday, 13 February and I went to it on the following Monday.
I would give it three and a half stars out of five. Part of this has to do with the fact that it wasn't fully operational. One of the rooms was being set up as a kitchen from thirty or forty years ago, possibly Mme Maigret's, but the work had just started.
I was not positively impressed with some of the practical aspects. The expo is in its own temporary structure in the center of Liege and easy to get to. The main problem is the entrance is on the opposite side of where most people will be approaching it from and there are no signs telling where to go to get in. To add to the confusion, you must pass two doors marked "Door Number One". You can't get into either one of them as they are both
emergency exits. Once inside the first thing you see is the cloakroom. You can go either left or right but there are no signs mentioning that the entrance is to the left and the ticket seller isn't visible from the entrance. Things pick up quite a bit once inside. All exhibits are explained in French and Dutch, Belgium's two main languages. There's nothing in German, Belgium's other language, and this is a bit odd as the Germanophone community isn't that far away from Luttich, which is what they call Liege. There's also nothing in English, also odd given Simenon's popularity around the world.
The first part is related to Simenon's family and his youth in Liege. After that you pass through several rooms made up as in a boat or barge. There are sections that deal with Maigret and with Simenon's other works. A number of books in other languages are on display to show that he's famous everywhere. There were things dealing with his wives and lovers plus his relations with his publishers. There's quite a bit to see and plan on an hour or so.
There were two representations of Maigret's office and I didn't care for them. There was no coal burning stove, no cupboard with the washbasin and the bottle of Cognac, and no lamp with a green shade on his desk. Also, the view out the "windows" was a ground floor view but his office was on the first. The view was also a problem out the 'window' of his appartment as the perspective was also from the ground floor level.
The end of the expo is a long corridor with books that go from floor to ceiling. The books were painted on the walls and each book went from floor to ceiling. I suppose it's like being an ant on a bookshelf as the books are very much taller than you are. I recognized many of the books, not just by title but also by edition, having a few of the same ones at home.
At the end is a representitive from the tourist office and you can get some free material here. Don't forget to pick up the guide to the walking tour,
which comes in four languages including English.
As it was below freezing, I decided to do the walking tour another day, like maybe in June.
There is nothing for sale in the expo; no books, no Maigret T-shirts, or whatever else. Not even a place to get a cup of coffee and a snack. Of course Liege doesn't lack for stuff like this and you may want to try the Bus Cafe across from the expo. Right next to it is a small newsagent selling Simenon books and related items including and expanded guidebook of the walking tour. A little farther on is the Liege branch of the FNAC chain and the books are located upstairs and maybe a little cheaper than the newsagent.
GETTING THERE
>From Brussels:
Take any train going to Liege, there are three or four each hour. Get off at Liege-Guillemens station. Take either a train to Liege Palais station (the
second stop), again several an hour or take buses 1 or 4 from the front of the station. From the Palais station, go up the stairs to get to street level. Go around to the left, which is downhill. You'll see the palace right away, walk toward it without crossing the street. At the corner of the palace you can see the expo tent. Remember to go to the far end of it and
around the corner to get inside. Entry is nine Euros. By bus, get off at the Place Lambert. The expo is visible from the bus stop. Belgian railways (www.sncb.com or www.nmbs.com) has a package deal available that gives a return fare from your departure point up to the Liege Palais station plus admission to the expo at a reduced rate.
>From Paris:
Fast (300 kmh/185mph) Thalys (www.Thalys.com) trains connect the two capitals with departures every 30 minutes during most of the day. If the destination of your Thalys is Koln/Cologne in Germany, it will also stop in Liege. If not, get off at Bruxelles Midi station and make a connection for
Liege as mentioned above. If your Thalys ticket is only for Brussels, first go downstairs and get a ticket to Liege as it's expensive to travel without one. Trains marked IC-A (Intercity route A) are the fastest and make the fewest stops. They run once each hour.
Regards,
Joe Richards
www.maigret.ch
2/23/03 –
A few weeks ago I was very happy to see that you announced a Maigret short-video I'd made [12/19/02]. Thanks!
Now I have published my website www.maigret.ch (in German):
- a feature about Maigret
- a feature about Simenon
- the video as mentioned above
- a radio-interview (Swiss Radio) I've participated in (Windows streaming audio)
- quotations from Maigret and Simenon
- Links (this site is already on this list)
I'm not a competitor of www.maigret.de! My idea is to give a personal view.
Kind regards,
Willi Flueckiger
Bern/Switzerland
Micheline autorail
2/24/03 –
In the notes to The Unlikely Monsieur Owen you mentioned that the Micheline autorail was powered by electricity. In fact it was a diesel powered railbus.
I'll have a little more to say on the expo soon. As it has become unseasonably warm here, I may get back to Liege before June for the walking tour. I need to get a city map so I can find the places listed in Maigret
and the Gai Moulin, which I'm rereading at the moment. Yours,
Joe Richards
"Maigret et le clochard" question
 | 2/24/03 –
Salut! Since you've written your page in English I will put my question in English. I am reading "Maigret and the bum" but I would be interested in reading a review of this book. The language don't matter.
I myself can't find any information concerning the plot from the book. Can you refer some internetpage or do you know something else written about this book?
Yours Sincerely,
Kiitos Ludwig
|
There's a plot summary here
Maigret - TV5
2/25/03 – Next week's (starting Saturday 1 March) Bruno Cremer offering on
TV5 in the UK is "Maigret et la maison du juge".
Best wishes,
Michael Newman
Chelmsford, UK
 | 2nd Maigret in Esperanto2/27/03 – I would like to draw your attention to a translation of a Maigret story which does not yet appear in your site: www.esperanto.org/Ondo/Nov02-14.htm
André Ruysschaert
|
Welcome Back! / Maigret's tobacco
2/27/03 – Great to have you back up and running.... ....the question relating to what type of tobacco Maigret smoked [2/15/03] was answered a long time ago [1/27/99] and I then repeated the answer recently. If my memory still serves me correct it was 'gris'.
Regards,
Steve Beamon
Aylesbury - UK
New website
 | 3/02/03 – I've seen special pictures on www.jossbeaumont.be.tf "Simenon by Maigret". It's new I think...
Joseph Jeanmart |
Just a little longer...
3/02/03 – Though I'm able to post messages and I've relocated, my computer and books haven't arrived yet, so I'm still muddling through with the Forum. Presumably this will only last a few more days, and then we should be back to the regularity and style to which you're more accustomed. And for those of you troubled by the loss of access to these pages a week ago or so, my apologies. A heavy traffic load brought down my server temporarily... it shouldn't happen again.
ST
Maigret et le clochard
 | 3/7/03 – Marion Brandl wrote [2/20/03] that in a French "Easy Reader" edition of "Maigret et le clochard," the name of the Quai where Doc slept before he installed himself under the Pont Marie is Quai de Bercy (not Quai de la Rapée, as I have in the plot summary).
In the Tout Simenon edition (Tome 11) it's: "...quai de la Rapée, sous le pont de Bercy," which corresponds to the English translation (in the Popular Library paperback, Chapter 5): "...on the Quai de la Rapée, under the Pont de Bercy."
I've added "pont de Bercy" to the plot summary. |
And speaking of plot summaries for this book, I wonder how this one at Amazon got written:
When Maigret learns that a bum's murder is in reality an assassination, he becomes deeply involved in what without him would have been left as an unremarkable event. Maigret must discover the identity of the man who had been living under the Seine bridge, then find out why anyone would want him dead. "Maigret learns that a bum's murder is in reality an assassination"?
ST
Maigret in Paris
3/9/03 – I've been searching the bulletin archives for an entry I recall but can't now find. It was about a couple of Belgians who were preparing a book about all the Parisian sites that occur in Inspector Maigret's investigations. I also recall it was to be published this year. Did I imagine this, and if I didn't does anyone if this project is still going ahead, and when the book will be published?
Rob Moore
Simenon...
 | 3/9/03 – Yesterday I bought a two-CD pack with 2h30 min of meetings with G. Simenon published by Radio France. It contains three interviews done in 1955, 1968 and 1975. You can find/buy it at
www.radiofrance.fr/divers/boutique/accueil. I will try to listen to it next week-end.
And here's an image of the Liege exposition I found on the Fnac web site.
Regards,
Jérôme Devémy |
Maigret in Paris
3/11/03 – In response to Rob Moore's question above, that was my submission of last March about the (then forthcoming) book by Claude Menguy and Michel Lemoine. I haven't heard any more about it. Maybe the Centre Simenon in Liège knows when the book is to be expected.
Guido de Croock
Maigret in Paris
3/16/03 – Regarding the post "Maigret in Paris" and other similar inquiries, I was always wondering how many of the places (especially Paris hotels and restaurants where Maigret would stop for a drink) mentioned in Maigret books are actual and how many are fiction. Best way to check, I guess, is against a Paris telephone book for the year when a particular Maigret book was written.
Vladimir
Maigret audio books
3/19/03 – Further to my note [9/24/98] about Maigret audio and the excellent Denham/Gough BBC releases the Beeb has now issued 4 stories with Nicholas Prevost — available, I assume, from BBC publications.
I regret not acquiring the Geoffrey Hutchings EMI tapes as they now seem unavailable.
Clive Smith
Sous peine de mort
3/19/03 – Does anyone know if there's an English translation of the non-Maigret short story "Sous peine de mort"? This is one of the stories in "Maigret et les petit cochons sans queue," [Maigret and the Little Tailless Pigs] set on the island of Porquerolles. Thanks,
Guido
Correction
3/23/03 – The correct web links for the Belgian railways are www.sncb.be in French and www.nmbs.be in Dutch and NOT what I put in the review of the Simenon Expo [2/21/03]. It doesn't matter which you choose as you can get it in English on either one.
Joe Richards
Simenon in Paris Match - 1955
3/25/03 –
original French
In six reels of radio confessions
the author of 164 novels reveals
the secrets of his creation
Simenon Confesses
3/26/03 – According to SIMENON CONFESSES article [above], Simenon's working habit was to write early in the morning, finish by about 9 am and pass the newly finished writing to his wife, without ever re-reading his work. Then until lunch he would rest alone. After lunch he would do various things with his wife and family, but never discussed his work with his wife.
When did his wife read the work he finished early in the morning? My most logical assumption is that she read it late in the morning until lunch, while Simenon was resting.
Why would Simenon have his wife read his work if they did not discuss it? Is it possible that she not just read it, but also edited and "polished"? Is that possible that others, maybe professional editors, helped her in editing and "polishing" Simenon's work? Just curious.
Here is why I am curious. To me, Simenon's works (not only Maigrets, other novels as well) look as well written work, where each word is highly "polished" for a good fit with the rest of words. Of course, I am speaking about English translations, where translator could have done some "improvements". However, I assume that original work in French is equally well done. Any comments from those lucky to read Simenon in French?
Considering that producing such quality work on first draft is somewhat unlikely, and since Simenon himself never re-read or edited his work (as many sources indicate), someone must have done this for Simenon. If that is true, they deserve some credit, do they not?
Regards,
Vladimir
Simenon's mot juste
3/27/03 –
Vladimir's comments [above] are interesting. But I don't think Simenon had a lot of help from his wife – or from his mistress who at one point was living in a
menage à trois with him and his wife. Simenon was a natural genius.
Simenon seldom had a translator who improved on his language. Quite the
contrary – one reason I've kept up my French is his novels are so much better in the original. Simenon was the master of the "mot juste", the exactly appropriate word, that never can be translated well. An example drawn totally at random from the first page I opened in the first book that came to hand, "Le voleur de Maigret" (p. 35):
"Le restaurant était modeste. La plupart des clients travaillait dans le
quartier et mangeaient en solitaires tout en parcourant un journal. Les
steaks étaient servis, les frites assez croustillantes."
Every word is perfect. In three or four short lines, Simenon has described
a bistrot you could visit even today, in the quartier du Commerce. Note the word "solitaires". He could have had them eating "seuls" (alone). "En solitaires" says the same thing without hinting that the regular diners found anything wrong with being alone. Note the word "tout". It changes in a subtle way that I can better understand than explain the picture of the diners reading their newspaper. And the word "assez". It translates as "enough", but it really means in this context, "perfectly, deliciously."
Steve could translate this better than I, but I would expect an ordinary
translator to write,
"The restaurant was without pretension. Most of the customers worked in
the neighborhood and ate alone while reading a newspaper. The steaks were
served; the fries were sufficiently crisp."
No matter how much you improve that translation, you are never, ever going
to come close to the artistry Simenon used in his choice of French words.
So, no, I don't think Simenon got much help with his writing, and I don't
think he needed it. Possibly his wife had a comment or two on the characters or action of the novel-in-progress after the kids were put in bed, the one time Simenon does not claim he refused to think about his novel. No more than that, I don't think.
Oz Childs
Pocket Essentials Simenon
3/28/03 –
A review by Steven Poole from The Guardian (15.03.2003)
Georges Simenon, by David Carter (Pocket Essentials, 2003, £3.99)
Simenon was born a century ago this year. He sold 500m copies of his novels, and claimed in a famous interview with Fellini that he had slept with 10,000 women. This tiny book on a man with gigantic appetites (or, at the least, a gigantic imagination) offers precis nuggets covering all 103 novels (including the entire Maigret series), with the strange decision to mark each one out of five, and some critical "comments" that range from the banal to the just weird: "This is quite a short novel, but it manages to reflect very well the infighting that goes on within a provincial family," reads one; it's anyone's guess as to what that "but" is doing. Doubtless, though, this will be a useful descriptive bibliography for fans, and it is amusing to learn of Simenon's publishers' doubts as to whether the relatively new-fangled detective genre would ever be commercially successful. SP
Roddy Campbell
This book is essentially a checklist of all the Simenons, with summaries, preceded by about 10 pages of succinct commentary on the author and his works. Poole's comment "...all 103 novels (including the entire Maigret series)..." may be misleading. There are summaries of the 103 Romans Durs ("hard" novels) and all 79 Maigret books (including the short story collections), as well as Simenon on film. Poole's "...strange decision to mark each one out of five.." refers to Carter's system of rating each book on a scale of five. (I'm pleased to note that on the last page [p. 94], under Internet Resources, it's this website, thank you, although unfortunately the URL is misspelled.) Here's a sample entry:
70) Maigret's Pickpocket
(Le voleur de Maigret, 1967). Hamilton, 1968; Harcourt, USA, 1968; in The Second Simenon Omnibus (Penguin 3185, 1970). Also translated as Maigret And The Pickpocket (Harvest, USA, 1985).
Plot: While traveling on a bus Maigret has his wallet stolen, but the following day the pickpocket contacts him. He proves to be a journalist and would-be screenplay writer who is suspected of the murder of his wife and who wants Maigret to prove his innocence. Maigret mingles in the world of filmmakers, discovering that the wife had been the lover of a film director. He follows several false trails but arrives finally at the simple truth.
Comments: Many feel that this is not one of the best Maigrets, but there is good characterization to enjoy. 3/5
ST
Simenon's mot juste
3/30/03 – Further to Oz Childs insightful comments in 'Simenon's mot juste' [above]. The word 'alone' could be translated as 'solo', like 'pilot made a solo flight' or 'a climber went solo on the mountain'. However, English 'solo' does not sound right in the contexts of eating in a restaurant. Unfortunately, the word 'alone' does not really fit either. Another choice would be 'by themselves', but this is not very good, either.
The above case is just one more example that an artful expression is almost impossible to translate without losing something in translation.
Vladimir
Maigret sites updated
3/30/03 – Amis Maigretphiles, bonsoir !
Un petit mail pour vous annoncer quelques changements, ajouts et modifications en tous genres sur le site. |
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Madame Maigret's Own Case ($8.00 / 0-15-602849-2). Madame Maigret's trip to the dentist brings surprising insight to a baffling case.
Maigret and the Apparition ($8.00 / 0-15-602838-7). A colleague of Maigret's is brutally attacked, and the only clue is a single word the victim whispers as he drifted out of consciousness: "apparition."
Maigret and the Bum ($8.00 / 0-15-602839-5). One of the harmless vagrants who live along the Seine is bludgeoned and thrown into the river, revealing a new underworld to Inspector Maigret.
Maigret and the Burglar's Wife ($8.00 / 0-15-602840-9). A safe-manufacturer-turned-burglar stumbles upon a dead body while committing a robbery: Will Maigret crack the case?
Maigret and the Saturday Caller ($8.00 / 0-15-602842-5). When a fearful man shows up on Maigret's doorstep, confessing to a murder he intends to commit, the Inspector must investigate a crime that is yet to happen.
Maigret and the Spinster ($8.00 / 0-15-602843-3). Maigret's guilty conscience over dismissing a victim's complaints propels him into the search for a murderer, or maybe more.
Maigret at the Gai-Moulin ($8.00 /0-15-602845-X). Maigret goes undercover to expose a murderer in a twisted chain of events at a famous Liège nightclub.
Maigret and the Wine Merchant ($8.00 / 0-15-602844-1). When a rich wine merchant is murdered, the killer's motive may not be what it seems.
Maigret and the Killer ($8.00 / 0-15-602841-7). The investigation of a murder with no apparent motive pushes Maigret to look beyond the simple question of guilt and innocence.
Maigret and the Madwoman ($8.00 / 0-15-602850-6). An elderly woman is frightened because someone has been moving her furniture when she is away, but by the time Maigret investigates, she is already dead.
Maigret and the Man on the Bench ($8.00 / 0-15-602837-9). The only clues to this murder lies in the victim's strange behavior before his death – he'd taken to sitting alone on a bench wearing clothes strikingly out of character.
Maigret Loses His Temper ($8.00 / 0-15-602847-6). Maigret investigates the perplexing murder of a nightclub owner who, at first glance, seems to have no enemies.
Maigret in Holland ($8.00 / 0-15-602852-2). Human appetites clash with small-town respectability when a teacher in a prim Dutch village is murdered.
Maigret's Boyhood Friend ($8.00 / 0-15-602851-4). A string of lovers and a murder tinged with blackmail make one woman's death a complicated affair for Maigret.
Maigret Sets A Trap ($8.00 / 0-15-602848-4). Five stocky woman are brutally knifed in the streets. Can Maigret lure the murderer into a clever trap?
Maigret's Christmas ($14.00 / 0-15-602853-0). Nine holiday-themed
mini-mysteries perfect for gift-giving.
