Simenon Georges (Jose Christian).
No wonder, probably, Simenon considered his teachers the Russian classic writers Gogol Dostoevsky, Chekhov. Answering questions from journalists, Simenon said that it was these writers who inspired him with love for the little man, sympathy for the humiliated and offended, made him think about the problem of crime and punishment, taught him to look into the bottom of human souls.
The future writer was born in the Belgian city of Liege in the family of a modest employee of an insurance company. Simenon's grandfather was a craftsman, a "hatter", as Simenon later wrote, and his great-grandfather was a miner. The Simenon family was religious, and the boy had to go to mass every Sunday, although then he lost his faith and stopped observing the rites. But all the same, the mother wanted her son to become a curate in the future or, at worst, a confectioner. Maybe it would have happened that way, but life turned everything in its own way.
Foreign students lived in Simenon's house, and they rented cheap rooms with a boarding house. There were many Russians among them. They introduced the young man to literature, fascinated him with Russian classics and, in general, determined his future fate. In addition to literature, Simenon also became interested in medicine and law, and later tried to combine all this in his work.
True, at first he did not even think that he would become engaged in literary work, and chose journalism, although he had never read newspapers before, and imagined this work only from the novels of the then-famous French writer Gaston Leroux, who wrote detective stories. The protagonist, an amateur detective Roultabile, acted in them, who wore a raincoat and smoked a short pipe. For some time, Simenon imitated his beloved hero, and did not part with the pipe until the end of his life. Commissar Maigret, the hero of Simenon's detective works, also smoked a pipe. Reporters also acted in the novels of Gaston Leroux.
While still a college student, Simenon began working part-time in the editorial office of the Gazette de Liege, where he kept a police chronicle, calling six police stations in the city of Liege twice a day and visiting the Central Commissariat.
Simenon did not have to finish his studies at the college, because his father became seriously ill. The young man served his military service and after the death of his father went to Paris, hoping to arrange his future there.
For some time, Simenon worked part-time in newspapers and magazines in the departments of the court chronicle and excitedly read entertaining novels popular in the twenties, the authors of which no one remembers now. Once Simenon came up with the idea that he could write a novel no worse, and in a short time he wrote his first major work - "The Typist's Novel". It came out in 1924, and since that year, in just ten years, Simenon has published 300 novels and short stories under various pseudonyms, including Georges Sim.
By that time, Simenon was already married to his countrywoman from Liege, a girl named Tizhi. He brought her to Paris, and she began to paint. Then Simenon recalled with humor that Tizhi became a famous artist faster than he, and for a long time he remained just her husband, although he had already published his works.
They led a bohemian life, visited cafes in Montparnasse, beloved by artists and writers, and when they managed to get a good fee or sell paintings at a higher price, they left to travel. Once they traveled through the canals of France on the yacht Ginette, and after that Simenon decided to build his own sailboat.
On this sailboat called the Ostrogoth, Simenon sailed along the rivers of Belgium and Holland, went out into the North Sea to Bremen and Wilhelmshaven. He liked to work on a sailboat, he printed his novels in a warm cabin, relaxed on deck and enjoyed life. On the way back, they again ended up in the north of Holland, in the town of Delfzijl, and decided to spend the winter there. It was in this cozy port in 1929 that Simenon's first novel was born with the participation of Commissar Maigret, which will glorify his name. Although this novel itself - "Peter the Latvian" - is little known.
This novel marked the beginning of a whole series of works in which the police commissioner Maigret acts - "Mr. Galle died", "Hanged on the gates of the church of Saint-Folien", "Groom from the barge" Providence "", "The price of the head" and others.
The publisher Feuillard, to whom Simenon brought his first detective novel, is considered by many to have an unerring instinct as to whether the work would succeed or not. The writer later recalled in his autobiographical book “I Dictate” how, after reading the manuscript, Feyar said: “What, in fact, did you scribble here? Your novels are not like a real detective story. A detective novel develops like a chess game: the reader must have all the data at his disposal. You don't have anything like it. And your commissar is by no means perfect - not young, not charming. Victims and murderers evoke neither sympathy nor antipathy. Everything ends sadly. There is no love, there are no weddings either. I wonder how you hope to captivate the public with all this?
However, when Simenon extended his hand to collect his manuscript, the publisher said, “What can you do! We'll probably lose a lot of money, but I'll take a chance and try it out. Send six more of the same novels. When we have a supply, we will start printing one a month.”
So in 1931 the first novels of the Maigret Cycle appeared. Their success exceeded all expectations. It was then that the author began to sign the works with his real name - Georges Simenon.
Simenon wrote his first novel from the Maigret cycle in just six days, and the other five in a month. In total, 80 works were published, where the famous Commissioner of the Criminal Police operates. Readers fell in love with his image so much that even during the life of Simenon in the city of Delfzijl, where he invented his hero, a bronze monument to Commissioner Maigret was erected.
So Simenon instantly became a famous writer. Now he had the means to make longer journeys. Simenon visited Africa, India, South America, USA and other countries.
He later recalled: “For many years I wandered around the world, eagerly trying to comprehend people and their true essence ... In Africa, I happened to spend the night in Negro huts, and it happened that I was carried for whole stretches of the way in a stretcher, which they call type. However, even in those villages where men and women went naked, I saw ordinary people, such as everywhere else.
Simenon traveled almost the whole world until he realized that people are the same everywhere and are experiencing the same problems. But that was much later. And in his younger years, he absorbed impressions, met people and observed their life, in order to later reflect all this in his novels. In those places that he especially liked, the writer stayed for a long time, it happened that he bought a house there so that nothing would disturb his peace. He needed rest in order to write. Although he could write anywhere. Simenon always carried a typewriter with him and worked almost daily. He took it with him even when he left home and could print on the street, in cafes, on the pier, causing surprise to passers-by.
Simenon never previously collected material for his works. He had an excellent memory, which stored countless facts and flashed, once images. As the writer himself said, he constantly had two or three topics in his head that worried him and about which he constantly thought. After some time, he stopped at one of them. However, he never started work before finding "the atmosphere of the novel". Sometimes a smell, a change in the weather, or even the quiet shuffling of footsteps along the path was enough to evoke some association or memories in the writer .. After a few hours or days, the atmosphere of the novel already arose, and then people appeared, future characters.
Only after that, the writer took telephone directories, geographical atlases, city plans, in order to accurately imagine the place where the action of his future novel would unfold.
When Simenon began to write, his characters, initially vague, acquired a name, an address, a profession, and became so real people that the writer's own "I" faded into the background and his characters acted on their own. According to the writer, only at the end of the novel did he find out how the story he describes would end. And in the process of work, he was so immersed in their lives that mimicry occurred: the whole appearance of the writer, his mood changed depending on how he felt. blame yourself for his heroes. Sometimes he became old, hunched over a grump, sometimes, on the contrary, condescending and complacent.
True, for the time being, he himself did not notice such oddities in himself, until his relatives opened his eyes to this. After which Simenon began to joke that now he could repeat after Flaubert his famous phrase: “Madame Bovary is me.”
Some critics believed that Simenon reflected many of his own character traits and even his habits in the image of Maigret. There is some truth in this, but only a fraction. Simenon always tried not to confuse himself with his heroes, although he partially put his reasoning, his understanding of life and people into the mouth of Commissar Maigret.
Commissioner Maigret is not at all like other famous detectives, such as Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christie or Sherlock Holmes in Conan Doyle. He does not have an outstanding analytical mind and does not use any special methods in his investigations. This is an ordinary police officer with a secondary medical education. He does not have a special culture, but he has an amazing flair for people. Commissar Maigret is naturally endowed with common sense and has vast life experience. First of all, he wants to understand why a person became a criminal, therefore, despite the ridicule of his colleagues, he delves into his past. Maigret sees his goal not only in detaining the criminal, but is pleased when he manages to prevent the crime. Simenon also has in common with his hero that they live "in peace and harmony with themselves."
Simenon's novels from the "Maigre cycle" differ from most classical and modern works written in the detective genre. All these novels are based on complex crimes, and their investigation resembles an ingenious puzzle. Simenon, on the other hand, aims to explain the social and political motives of the crime. His heroes are not professional killers and not swindlers, but ordinary people who break the law not because of their criminal inclinations, but because of circumstances that turned out to be stronger than both them and human nature in general.
In addition to the Maigret cycle, Simenon also wrote other novels that critics call socio-psychological. He worked on them interspersed with his detective works. In the early thirties, Simenon's novels such as "Hotel on the Pass in Alsace", "Passenger from the Polar Line", "The Lodger", "House on the Canal" and others were published.
Each journey of Simenon gave him impressions and themes for new works. So, returning from Africa, Simenon wrote the novels Moonlight (1933), Forty-five Degrees in the Shadow (1934), White Man with Glasses (1936), where he considered the problem of colonial dependence of African countries, oppression and racism.
In 1945, Simenon left for the USA and lived there for ten years. Sometimes he came to Europe briefly on business, such as in 1952 in connection with his election as a member of the Belgian Academy of Sciences. In the USA, Simenon created the novels Unknown in the City (1948), The Rico Brothers and The Black Ball (1955), in which he describes a country of “amazing technology and no less amazing cruelty”, with its own specific way of life, where such same, as elsewhere, hypocrisy and prejudice, forcing people to be biased towards "newcomers" and consider them guilty of any crimes.
In 1955, Simenon returned to Europe and lived in Switzerland almost without a break. As before, he continues to work hard. However, in all his works, he actually develops the same themes, returning to them at different periods of his life and considering problems from a different angle.
Simenon was always worried about alienation between people, especially between relatives, enmity and indifference in families, loneliness. He wrote about this in his novels Strangers in the House (1940), Confessional (1966), November (1969) and others.
The family for Simenon has always been important, as well as the problem of relationships with children. This is what his novels “The Destiny of the Malu Family”, “The Watchmaker from Everton”, “Son” and others are devoted to.
Simenon's own family life developed quite well, although he was married three times. The first wife of the writer, the artist Tizhi, after several years of family life, gave birth to his son Mark. However, their life together did not work out. In his second marriage, he had three children - two sons, Johnny and Pierre, and a daughter, Marie-Jo. The writer's second wife was seventeen years younger than him, but this was not the reason why their relationship went wrong. They broke up, but his wife never gave him a divorce, and with his third wife, Teresa, who was twenty-three years younger than Simenon, he lived in a civil marriage until the end of his life. Nevertheless, according to Simenon, it was she who played the most important role in his life - "allowed me to know love and made me happy."
Simenon always said that he was far from politics, and even considered himself an apolitical person. In 1975, he wrote in his memoirs: “Only today I realized that I had been silent all my life. In the case of a man who has written more than two hundred novels, of which two or three are semi-autobiographical, this may seem paradoxical. And yet it is true. I was silent even by the fact that I never put a ballot in the ballot box.”
However, during the war years, he helped Belgian refugees who were threatened with deportation to Germany. British paratroopers were hiding in his house. And immediately after Hitler came to power, Simenon banned the publication of his works in Nazi Germany. Simenon described the suffering of ordinary people during the years of war and occupation in his novels The Clan of Ostend (1946), Mud in the Snow (1948) and The Train (1951).
Until the end of his life, Simenon followed the events in the world and criticized the existing order in an interview with journalists.
At the end of 1972, Simenon decided not to write any more novels, leaving another Oscar novel unfinished. There were no special reasons for this, except that the writer was tired and decided to live his own life, and not the life of his heroes. “I rejoiced. I became free, ”he said some time later into the recorder, which replaced his typewriter. Since then, Simenon really did not write any more novels. For several years he simply lived, sometimes turning on the recorder and talking about his past life, partly analyzing it, his work, his relationships with people. After some time, his last book was published, which is called “I Dictate”.
Police Commissioner Maigret (he hates his own name, and even his wife calls him only by his last name) acquired his appearance in the first novel and practically did not change by the last one. Maigret appears at the age of forty-five, already well-known in professional circles. He has a slightly silvery gray whiskey, a heavy black coat, a bowler hat, a set of smoking pipes, a tie that he never managed to tie properly. There was something plebeian in his figure. He was huge, broad-boned, with taut muscles looming under the suit. In addition, he had his own special manner of holding himself, as if on a person. Even colleagues did not always like it. There was something more than confidence, and at the same time it could not be called arrogance..
Maigret is married, unlike many literary detectives, and Madame Maigret is his faithful friend, a caring housewife who shows a sincere interest in everything her husband is doing. This lyrical motif, passing through the novels, creates perhaps the only example of mutual understanding and warmth, the analogue of which it would be in vain to look for in the world where Maigret works.
In professional terms, this is a lone hero, despite all his declared affection for his younger colleagues, Luke's assistants, Janvier, Lapointe. In the first novels, Inspector Torrance was still active, whom Georges Simenon, getting excited, killed in St. Petersburg-Latysh , and then returned back to life as if nothing had happened. Torrance would later become a private investigator and open his own Agency "O" , but will still cooperate with Inspector Luke and Chief of the Criminal Police. Series of stories Cases of agency "O" characterized by an ironic, partly even humorous attitude of the author to the described investigations, the command of the characters.
Maigret is one of those inspectors who are called walking. His style of work is detailed, thorough conversations with a wide range of people, which, in his opinion, can provide information not only about movements object, but, to a greater extent, about his demeanor, lifestyle. Maigret, like a gold digger, sifts waste rock, hoping to catch at least a grain of valuable information in each tray. His method does not require collective creativity, because it most of all resembles an exceptionally developed intuition based on a penchant for psychoanalysis.
Simenon, as if anticipating reproaches for the lack of development of his own investigation process, often gives an external assessment of the activities of his hero at the climax: ... hardly anyone can imagine Maigret's jubilation at this moment. However, there is such a person - this is Luka, who looks at his boss and is ready to swear that he has tears in his eyes.
The commissar unraveled the whole tangle himself, having no data, except for those to which no one paid attention, unraveled thanks to his phenomenal intuition and terrifying ability to get used to his neighbors. (Signature "Picpus" ).
The traditions of the police novel, to which Maigret's series should have been close, are taken into account very weakly by Simenon. Basically just an exposition. Peter the Latvian , made in a classic style, designed for recognition detective lovers. Few of its components (external surveillance, the use of forensics) seem to be props for the main theme. Quickly discovering a small circle of people associated with the leader of an international gang of swindlers who paid a visit to Paris, Maigret receives very comprehensive information about the main subject of his concerns. He remains catch the moment when a person is behind the player. It is on human weaknesses, or rather, on human in any of the criminals and builds his own line of investigation of Maigret.
He does not, as a rule, need fingerprints, laboratory tests and other forensic paraphernalia of an official police inquiry. All this, if carried out in novels, then on periphery action and confirm conjectures inspector. It seems that in the course of the investigation, Maigret simply absorbs, like a sponge, the traditions and habits of the people of the circle to which the suspect belongs, to the point that he begins to feel himself in the skin object of persecution. Duration immersion process depends on the specific environment, but in any case, sooner or later, there comes a moment when information reaches a certain critical mass, and Maigret gains firm confidence not only in who killed, but also in the idea of the whole background of the events that led to the crime.
Yes, in Newfoundland squash (original title On a date in Ter Nova ), one of Maigret's early novels, getting acquainted with a strange incident in a small fishing village, spends most of the novel's time in a local tavern, where rest after the flight crews. Plebeian, as the author deliberately emphasizes, Maigret feels quite comfortable in this brothel, and most importantly, he is able to provoke almost everyone who is interested in frankness.
Getting used to the atmosphere of the place is so effective that it is not difficult for Maigret to even imagine the outline of events on board the fishing vessel - the very backstory which resulted in the death of two people.
The fact that Simenon is true to himself is confirmed, for example, by such a small observation. In the novels, separated by more than thirty years, the final scene is repeated one to one: the inspector talks peacefully with main culprit over a bottle of wine, in a dressing gown, with a mutual desire to recreate an objective picture of previous events ( Newfoundland squash and Maigret and the wine merchant ).
In general, the role of the punishing sword of the law is alien to Maigret. This wrong a police officer, then enabling the criminal to commit suicide without bringing the case to judicial publicity ( Maigret's wrath ), or even letting him go in peace, as he is convinced that he has the moral right to do so ( The man who hanged himself in the church ).
And in the novel Town in the fog (Inspector Kadavr ) the situation is modeled in such a way that only an unofficial investigation allows the author to fully reveal the mystery of the murder of a young man and at the same time not apply any sanctions against the killer.
Immersion Maigret in the life of the provincial town of Saint-Aubin, performed by the writer traditionally in detail, shows all the wretched and sanctimonious morality of its inhabitants. All possible assistance is provided to him by a local young man, a friend of the victim. He is one of those Louis says about someone. be one of those in his understanding it meant to be an accomplice in a conspiracy of silence, to belong to the number of people who want to live as if everything in this world is arranged in the best possible way ...
Simenon's classic relation of a couple investigator - suspect Maigret himself expressed in the same novel: It seems to me - I'm even almost convinced of this! - that although you are responsible for the death of Albert Retaio, you are also a victim yourself. I will even say more: you were the instrument of the crime, but you were not really to blame for his death..
Over the years, the figure of Maigret, his inner world, his philosophical attitude to events, occupy an increasing place in novels. Some of them are directly devoted to the biography of the hero ( Affair of Saint-Fiacre , Maigret's notes ). The detective gets close to difficult novels. Maigret and I have changed a lot, - says Simenon in the sixties. - And in the novels where Maigret acts, I sometimes pose more complex problems than in my socio-psychological novels. Maigret's experience and wisdom help me resolve them and make them accessible to readers from different countries and different cultural levels..
Despite the fact that Maigret almost never appears in his office during the investigation, the novels with his participation cannot be classified as dynamic. Their main content is the dialogues that the police commissioner has with many people. These are conversations, not interrogations ( Maigret realized with terrifying obviousness that it was possible to instantly paralyze several people at once with a simple question: “what exactly did you do between six and seven in the evening?”), and their meaning is clearly visible from a fragment of Maigret's conversation with his old friend Dr. Pardon:
- You are one of those who are called to restore justice ... And yet, it can be said that when you arrest the guilty, you do it as if with regret.
- It happens, right.
- At the same time, you take the investigation to heart, as if it were your own.
Maigret smiled mirthlessly.
- After all, every time I come into contact with someone's difficult fate and, as it were, go through the life path of this person anew, looking for the motives of his actions ... When you go to an unknown patient, does not his cure become your personal matter and you do not fight for him? life, as if this patient is the most precious thing for you?
Commissioner Megre entered the history of detective literature on an equal footing with Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot and Nero Wolfe. This is just the case when, no matter how hard the writer tries, he cannot get rid of the hero, who begins to live his own, completely authentic life. And Maigret was such a realistic character that in 1966 they even erected a monument to him in his "homeland" - in Delfzijl, where in 1929 Georges Simenon wrote the first novel about the commissioner, "Peter the Latvian". Although, in fact, Maigret was also mentioned in the earlier works of Simenon. In total, Simenon wrote more than 80 works about the commissar, including 76 novels.
Jules Joseph Anselm Maigret was born in 1915 in the village of Saint-Fiacre near Matignon in the family of the estate manager, the Count of Saint-Fiacre. (Further on, of the entire long name, the commissioner will use only the surname, in extreme cases, the first name. It is reproduced in full only once - in the novel Maigret's Revolver).
Marital status: Maigret married very young, but he never had children. The only relatives of the Maigret couple are the commissioner's sister-in-law, Madame Maigret's sister. Commissar Maigret's family is a reliable rear, an example of integrity and family comfort. By the way, Simenon was very sympathetic to Soviet critics for his defiant contrasts between the decent commissar who came from the petty bourgeoisie and his simple family to "unhealthy" relations in the criminal environment and high society. Maigret is always sure that his wife is waiting for him at home, who will definitely prepare a delicious lunch and dinner, give him grog to drink if he freezes and forbid smoking his favorite pipe if the commissioner has a cold.
Simenon, known for his love of women, populated his novels with numerous beautiful and often accessible (not to say dissolute) women. However, Commissioner Maigret never experienced any romantic feelings for any of the women involved in this or that criminal case, regardless of their beauty. All of them for him were always only suspects, witnesses, or criminals, although human sympathy is not alien to the commissioner. But only sympathy - Maigret is extremely devoted to his wife, with whom he lived for many years in Paris on the Boulevard Richard-Lenoir. After retiring, Maigret bought a house in the countryside and moved there with his wife. However, even in retirement, the commissioner sometimes participated in investigations.
Maigret method
Maigret's method: To understand the logic of the criminal, Maigret needs to immerse himself in the environment where the crime was committed and try to understand what kind of person the suspects are, including putting himself in their place. Many call him a "human commissar" because Maigret repeatedly felt more sympathy for the perpetrator than for the victim. Simenon repeatedly emphasizes that ordinary people with their firm ideas of good and evil are much closer to the commissioner than the high society with its double morality.
Maigret's habits
Chief among them is the commissar's invariable pipe, with which he tries not to part and the theft of which (see the novel Maigret's Pipe) is perceived as a personal insult and intrusion into his life. In general, the commissar's habits are extremely simple, and he often feels embarrassed for them in front of the more "refined" natures that he encounters at work. However, nothing will make Maigret give up what gives him pleasure. He likes to have a glass or two of beer in Parisian pubs, a couple of glasses of white wine or a glass of Calvados - depending on the situation. If Maigret, during an interrogation at the commissariat on the quai Orfevre, orders beer and sandwiches at the pub "Au Dauphine", located opposite, then a long night of work lies ahead. And crime journalists are well aware of this - on the basis of these signs, they often make their assumptions about the course of the investigation. Maigret also loves Paris very much, especially in spring and on sunny days, it gives him great pleasure to sometimes go to the cinema with his wife, and then dine in some small restaurant.
Team Maigret
The commissioner always works with the same inspectors who are ready for him to do much, if not all. Maigret repays them with the same devotion. The commissioner's team includes inspector Janvier, Lucas, Torrance and the youngest of them, Lapointe, whom the commissioner often calls "baby".
Maigret's popularity was so great that the commissioner became for Simenon about the same as Sherlock Holmes for Conan Doyle. In the bibliography of the writer there are enough works that not only have nothing to do with Maigret, but are not detectives either, but he is known primarily as the creator of the image of the "human commissar". Well, as usual, literary critics came to the conclusion that in the image of Maigret, Simenon reflected many traits of his own character and even his habits. However, the biography of the writer showed that this is not entirely true, although, undoubtedly, Simenon expressed many of his thoughts, understanding of the life and motives of human actions through his hero.
Maigret monument
In 1966, in the Dutch town of Delfzijl, where Commissioner Maigret was "born" in the first novel of the cycle, a monument was erected to this literary hero, with the official presentation of a certificate of the "birth" of the famous Maigret to Georges Simenon, which read as follows: "Megre Jules, was born in Delfzijl 20 February 1929 .... at the age of 44 years ... Father - Georges Simenon, mother unknown ... ".
List of books
Peters the Latvian (Pietr-le-Letton)
Horseman from the barge "Providence" (Le charretier de la Providence)
The late Mr. Galle
Hangman of Saint-Folien
Head Price (aka The Man from the Eiffel Tower)
Yellow dog (Le chien jaune)
The Mystery of the Crossroads of the Three Widows (La nuit du carrefour)
Crime in Holland (Un crime en Hollande)
Newfoundland squash (Au rendez-vous des Terre-Neuvas)
Dancer of the "Merry Mill"
Twopenny zucchini (La guinguette a deux sous)
Shadow on the curtain (L'ombre chinoise)
Case of Saint-Fiacre
The Flemings
Port of the Mists
Maniac from Bergerac (Le fou de Bergerac)
Bar "Liberty"
Gateway No. 1
Maigret (aka Maigret is back)
Barge with two hanged men (novel, first book publication: 1944)
Drama on the Boulevard Beaumarchais (novel)
Open window (novel)
Mister Monday (novel)
Jomon, stop 51 minutes (story)
Death penalty (novel)
Drops of stearin (novel, Les larmes de bougie)
Rue Pigalle (novel)
Maigret's mistake (novel)
Shelter for the drowned (story)
Stan the killer (novel)
North Star (novel)
Storm over the English Channel (novel)
Mrs. Berta and her lover (novel)
Notary of Chateauneuf (novel)
Unprecedented Mr. Owen (novel)
Players from the Grand Cafe (novel)
Admirer of Madame Maigret (novel)
The Lady of Bayeux (novel)
In the cellars of the Majestic Hotel
Judge's House
Cecile died
Death Threats (Menaces de mort, novel)
Signature "Picpus"
And Felicity is here!
Inspector Kadavr
Maigret's pipe (novel)
Maigret is angry
Maigret in New York
Poor people are not killed (novel)
Testimony of a boy from the church choir (novel)
The World's Most Stubborn Client (novel)
Maigret and the Inspector of the Klut (novel, Maigret et l'inspecteur malgracieux (malchanceux))
Maigret's vacation
Maigret and the Dead (Maigret et son mort)
Maigret's first case
My friend Maigret
Maigret at the Coroner's
Maigret and the old lady
Friend of Madame Maigret
The Seven Crosses in Inspector Lecker's Notebook (novel, published in English November 16, 1950)
Man on the street (novel)
Candlelight trading (novel)
Maigret's Christmas (novel)
Maigret's notes
Maigret at the Pickretts
Maigret in furnished rooms
Maigret and Lanky (Maigret et la grande perche)
Maigret, Lignon and gangsters
Maigret revolver
Maigret and the man on the bench
Maigret in alarm (Maigret a peur)
Maigret is wrong (Maigret se trompe)
Maigret at school
Maigret and the corpse of a young woman (Maigret et la jeune morte)
Maigret at the Minister
Maigret is looking for a head
Maigret sets a trap
Miss Maigret (Un echec de Maigret)
Maigret is having fun
Maigret travels
Maigret's doubts
Maigret and obstinate witnesses
Maigret's confessions
Maigret in a jury trial
Maigret and the old people
Maigret and the lazy thief
Maigret and decent people (Maigret et les braves gens)
Maigret and the Saturday client
Maigret and the Tramp
Maigret's wrath
The Secret of the Old Hollander (Megre and the Ghost)
Maigret defends herself
Maigret's Patience
Maigret and the Naur case
The man who robbed Maigret (bibl.)
Thief of Commissioner Maigret
Maigret in Vichy
Maigret hesitates
Maigret's childhood friend
Maigret and the killer
Maigret and the wine merchant
Maigret and the Mad Woman (La folle de Maigret)
Maigret and the lonely man (Maigret et l'homme tout seul)
Maigret and informer
Maigret and Monsieur Charles
Movies
1949 "The Man on the Eiffel Tower" (The Man on the Eiffel Tower / L'Homme de la tour Eiffel) - Charles Loughton
1956 "Maigret dirige l'enquête" - Maurice Manson (Maurice Manson)
1958 "Maigret spreads snares" (Maigret tend un piège) - Jean Gabin
1959 "Maigret and the case of Saint-Fiacre" (Maigret et l'affaire Saint-Fiacre) - Jean Gabin
1959 "Maigret and the Lost Life" (Maigret and the Lost Life) (TV) - Basil Sydney (Basil Sydney)
1963 "Maigret voit rouge" - Jean Gabin
1964 "Maigret: De kruideniers" (TV) - Kees Brusse (Kees Brusse)
1969 "Maigret at Bay" (TV series) - Rupert Davies (Rupert Davies)
1981 "Signé Furax" - Jean Richard (Jean Richard)
1988 "Merge (TV)" - Richard Harris
2004 "Maigret: Trap" (Maigret: La trappola) (TV) - Sergio Castellitto (Sergio Castellitto)
2004 "Maigret: Chinese Shadow" (Maigret: L'ombra cinese) (TV) - Sergio Castellitto (Sergio Castellitto)
TV serials
Maigret (1964-1968), Belgium/Netherlands, 18 episodes - Jan Teulings
"Investigations of Commissioner Maigret" (Le inchieste del commissario Maigret) (1964-1972), Italy, 16 episodes - Gino Cervi (Gino Cervi)
Maigret (1991-2005), France, 54 episodes - Bruno Kremer
Maigret (1992-1993), UK, 12 episodes - Michael Gambon
teleplays
"Death of Cecily" 1971, Central Television of the USSR - Boris Tenin
Maigret and the Man on the Bench, 1973, USSR Central Television - Boris Tenin
Maigret and the Old Lady 1974, USSR Central Television - Boris Tenin
"Megre hesitates" 1982, Central Television of the USSR - Boris Tenin
"Megre at the Minister" 1987, Central Television of the USSR - Armen Dzhigarkhanyan
There have been numerous attempts to film Maigret's adventures. He himself has been portrayed by French, British, Irish, Austrian, Dutch, German, Italian, and Japanese actors. One of the best Maigret is J. Gabin, a French actor who played a policeman in 3 films. In France, the role of Maigret was played by B. Kremer and J. Richard, the latter, by the way, was noted by critics, but Simenon himself, as they say, did not like Maigret in his performance. Simenon was more impressed by the Italian actor.
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Plot
Maigret has his own method of investigation, thanks to which he became the best detective in France. He unravels each crime in a leisurely manner inherent only to him. His investigations always lead to the disclosure of the true causes of the murder, and the truth is found where no one expects it.
The most famous and longest of the series based on the books of Georges Simenon. The office of Commissioner Maigret at 36 Orfevre Quay has become a place where criminal stories are unraveled.
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Notes
An excerpt characterizing Maigret (TV series)
- Natasha! she said in a barely audible voice.Natasha woke up and saw Sonya.
- Oh, you're back?
And with determination and tenderness, which happens in moments of awakening, she hugged her friend, but noticing the embarrassment on Sonya's face, Natasha's face expressed embarrassment and suspicion.
Sonya, did you read the letter? - she said.
“Yes,” Sonya said quietly.
Natasha smiled enthusiastically.
No, Sonya, I can't take it anymore! - she said. “I can't hide from you anymore. You know, we love each other!... Sonya, my dear, he writes... Sonya...
Sonya, as if not believing her ears, looked with all her eyes at Natasha.
- And Bolkonsky? - she said.
“Ah, Sonya, oh if only you could know how happy I am! Natasha said. You don't know what love is...
- But, Natasha, is it really all over?
Natasha looked at Sonya with large, open eyes, as if not understanding her question.
- Well, you refuse Prince Andrei? Sonya said.
“Ah, you don’t understand anything, don’t talk nonsense, you listen,” Natasha said with instant annoyance.
"No, I can't believe it," Sonya repeated. - I don't understand. How did you love one person for a whole year and suddenly ... After all, you only saw him three times. Natasha, I don't believe you, you're being naughty. In three days, forget everything and so ...
“Three days,” Natasha said. “I think I have loved him for a hundred years. I feel like I've never loved anyone before him. You cannot understand this. Sonya, wait, sit down here. Natasha hugged and kissed her.
“I was told that it happens and you heard it right, but now I have only experienced this love. It's not like before. As soon as I saw him, I felt that he was my master and I was his slave, and that I could not help but love him. Yes, slave! What he tells me, I will do. You don't understand this. What should I do? What should I do, Sonya? Natasha said with a happy and frightened face.
“But think about what you are doing,” Sonya said, “I can’t leave it like that. Those secret letters... How could you let him do that? she said with horror and disgust, which she could hardly conceal. January 27, 2011, 09:50
What I liked about this detective is that he is perceived as a living person. He has a family, worries, worries, he mopes because of failures. It seems to me that Maigret has one of the deepest characters of literary detectives. Commissioner Jules Joseph Anselm Maigret (fr. Сommissaire Jules Maigret) is the hero of the popular series of detective novels and short stories by Georges Simenon, a wise policeman. In the first book, where Megre (“Peters the Latvian”) is mentioned, he is shown as a minor person. Georges Simenon typed this book in 4-5 days on a typewriter on board the Ostrogoth. And so Commissar Maigret was “born”, a broad-shouldered, overweight man, in a bowler hat and a dense drape coat with a velvet collar and an invariable pipe in his teeth. In subsequent novels, he became the main character. Maigret's biography is described: in the "Saint-Fiacre Case" - about his childhood and youth, in "Megre's Notes" - about meeting with the future Madame Maigret and marrying her, about joining the police and the stages of his work on the Orfevre embankment. 
Jules Joseph Anselm Maigret was born in 1915 in the village of Saint-Fiacre near Matignon in the family of the estate manager, the Count of Saint-Fiacre. There he spent his childhood and youth. Simenon repeatedly mentions Maigret's peasant roots. Maigret, with his talent and perseverance in Paris, rose from an ordinary inspector to the position of divisional commissar, head of a brigade for investigating especially serious crimes. Maigret is unimaginable without a pipe, he has a whole collection of them. His wife is a housewife and loves to cook. Later, J. Curtin's cookbook "Madame Maigret's Recipes" was even written, which contains recipes for dishes mentioned in the novels of Georges Simenon. The couple had a child who soon died, which became a real drama for Mrs. Maigret. This is mentioned in passing in the story "Christmas in Maigret's House". They had no more children, and this fact was forever reflected in the commissar's attitude towards children and young people. Madame Maigret should not have been upset on Christmas morning, because the sight of children playing with gifts always made her think of failed motherhood. Therefore, the commissioner was especially attentive on this day. As a result of the events that took place during the investigation, a girl who was left without parents got into the Megre family. Maigret took care of her like her own daughter. Source - "Christmas in Maigret's House". 
In retirement, the commissioner retired to his own house, acquired long before the appointed time in Maine-sur-Loire. However, several times he had to leave the house and rush to Paris in order to again investigate the next crime. Maigret's wife has a nephew who also decided to work in the Paris police, but did not succeed. He gets into a most unpleasant story that the commissioner has to unravel. The commissioner did not speak foreign languages. Therefore, he had a hard time in England and America, where he visited several times. This infuriated the commissioner, which, however, did not prevent him from brilliantly investigating English and American secrets. Simenon dedicated 76 novels and 26 short stories to his favorite hero, Commissar Maigret. Maigret's adventures became the subject of 14 films and 44 television programs, during his lifetime 55 novels were filmed. Three dozen actors played Inspector Maigret in the cinema, including Jean Gabin, Harry Bauer, Albert Prejean, Charles Loughton, Gino Cervi, Bruno Kremer, etc. In Russia, the role of Commissar Maigret was played by Boris Tenin, Vladimir Samoilov and Armen Dzhigarkhanyan. 
In 1966, in the Dutch town of Delfzijl, where Commissar Maigret was “born” in the first novel of the cycle, a monument was erected to this literary hero, with the official presentation of a certificate of the “birth” of the famous Maigret to Georges Simenon, which read as follows: “Megre Jules, was born in Delfzijl February 20, 1929…. at the age of 44 years ... Father - Georges Simenon, mother unknown ... ". 
