Rampant in writing and sex
Georges Simenon was as famous for his sexual conquests as he was for Maigret, his son, John, tells
month and Rowan Atkinson has been signed up by ITV for two feature-length adaptations.
John Simenon, 66, has managed his father’s literary estate since 1995 because those nominated to take charge died within a few years of the author. A film distributor and producer, John was born in America but spent most of his childhood at the huge Simenon house on the shore of Lake Geneva, near Lausanne.
Georges was born in 1903 in Liege, Belgium and worked as a journalist and pulp fiction writer before moving to Paris where he had affairs with numerous women, including Josephine Baker, and became famous for Maigret. The novels are full of smoky, seedy Parisian atmosphere and what goes on inside the heads of the eponymous detective and his criminal adversaries is usually more important than the events surrounding a crime. ‘‘It is psychological suspense. The plot is very simple most of the time.’’
Although he might bash out several novels a year, there was time for travelling and journalistic projects. ‘‘Despite all that I have the feeling he was always there,’’ says John. ‘‘He was a normal father. He always claimed that his real job was to be a father and he was totally accessible. I would rehearse my class lessons with him.’’
The domestic set-up was complicated. In Paris Simenon had married Regine Renchon – Tigy – with whom he had a son, Marc. A woman called Henriette Liberge, known as Boule, became his secretary and lover. After World War II he moved to America and met Denyse Ouimet, a French-Canadian 17 years his junior. She became his lover and secretary and his wife when he divorced Tigy. With Ouimet, Simenon had two sons, including John, and a daughter, Marie-Jo. As the family moved around the US, Tigy and Marc came too, living in separate accommodation with Boule, who was, according to John, no longer a lover.
His parents’ separation in 1964 had nothing to do with his father’s superhuman unfaithfulness. ‘‘People will accept what I am saying or not, it doesn’t matter, but the problem was not in his sexual habits.’’
John Simenon accepts that his father wrote some antisemitic articles when he was 18, but says that he was told to do so by his employer and said later that they did not reflect his true views. After the war he was accused of collaborating because he had sold some rights to a company owned by Germans. He was later cleared.
After 19 Maigret novels in three years, Simenon retired his detective in 1933, only to bring him back in 1942 for another 56 books. He also wrote many non-Maigret novels, which he regarded as more serious work. He was talked of as a contender for the Nobel prize for literature but that eluded him. Was he disappointed?
‘‘He said no, but my conviction was that he probably was,’’ says his son.
The Maigret novels keep his name alive around the world. Each can be consumed in virtually one sitting. The language is very simple (Simenon used a vocabulary of little more than 2000 words) and the description spare. John says this helps the books to avoid seeming dated. A car is just a car, a house a house, with little further detail.
There has not been a British Maigret since Michael Gambon in the 1990s. Rupert Davies was an acclaimed Maigret in the 1960s and Richard Harris also played the part.
Atkinson describes himself as a ‘‘devourer’’ of the novels and was looking for a challenge away from comedy. Maigret is an intriguing character who solves crimes through intuition, drinks as heavily as Simenon did and often finds himself in the company of prostitutes. Where he differs from his creator is that he is the one doing the soliciting – and only for information. Afterwards the devoted husband scurries home for a quiet evening with his wife. In the Unlikely Event is Judy Blume’s first work of adult fiction in 16 years. Although Blume’s written three books for adults, she’s best known for her tales set in pre-adolescence. Many readers (Generation X in particular) will have fond memories of Blume’s YA novels, works that helped to navigate the messy and tricky pressures of puberty and beyond by frankly exploring familial, peer, and sexual relationships.
Blume’s previous adult novel, Summer Sisters, followed the lives of two women over a 20-year friendship. In the Unlikely Event is a more ambitious venture; instead of concentrating on one or two protagonists, the author crams her book with 20-odd cast members. The title refers to three real-life plane crashes that happened in Elizabeth, New Jersey, through 1951 and 1952.
Blume fictionalises the effect of these aerial disasters – within a three-month wintry period – on the residents at the time. Each respective viewpoint is allowed a couple of pages before the author switches to another narrator.
As a snapshot of small-town America in the 50s, In the Unlikely Event is a tapestry of fact and fiction. Elizabeth, quickly and cruelly dubbed ‘‘plane crash city’’, also happens to be Blume’s hometown – so she has first-hand experiences of the time and place. The novel is informed by her memories, but Blume has also turned to newspaper reports of the collisions to add a degree of verisimilitude to her writing.
Though several characters come and go, the focal point is 15-year-old Miri Ammerman, her family, and her circle of friends and acquaintances.
Septuagenarian Blume hasn’t lost her knack for writing perceptively about the pressures and attractions of teen life, albeit one that’s nestled in the mid-20th century. In between funeral attendances, Miri’s social and domestic worlds are explored in detail, with chaperoned parties, movies, dances and chaste kisses. In the Unlikely Event is full of the hubbub of community detail. Jean-Jacques Rousseau believed that children only gained the ability to reason when they reached their teens – but this hasn’t stopped French philosopher Astrid Desbordes from basing two collections of quirky children’s animal tales around the exploits of an anthropomorphic hamster who regards himself as a latter-day Rousseau.
Unfortunately, Hamster is also egotistical and selfish, with a complete lack of character and moral sense, which makes life tricky for the fellow inhabitants of the forest clearing (or subjects, as he calls them).
Travels of an Extraordinary Hamster is a sequel to Reflections of a Solitary Hamster (2009) and confirms Hamster’s position at the centre of the universe. Having visited the moon, he assures us that the hamsters there worship him as their cosmic idol. ‘‘My portrait adorns their buildings and monuments.’’
Fortunately, Mole, Hedgehog, Snail and the other animals manage to endure Hamster’s greed, conceit and pomposity with good grace. Pauline Martin’s illustrations are in comic book format, making this an ideal book for children with a sense of humour – or adults without one.
Don’t let the first couple of chapters put you off – this is a really good read, despite the cliched offering of a recipe at the end of some of the chapters and prose that sometimes tries too hard to be literary.
But New Zealand writer Hannah Tunnicliffe can tell a good story, with characters that find a way to your heart even when they’re being irritating or, in the case of protagonist Frankie Caputo, overly introspective.
Mind you, Frankie has every reason for emotional turmoil – her husband Alex drowns while out surfing at the end of the first chapter and, fleeing the funeral to escape to his family’s cabin north of Seattle, she finds Alex’s mother has placed a trespass order on her and she’s supposed to leave.
She ignores it and stays on to meet the eclectic, warm-hearted neighbours, discover a few unwelcome truths about Alex, and gradually find both herself and a way through her grief.
There is nothing extraordinary in having sex once a day. People recommend now to live to be old you have to have sex at least three to four times a week.
John Simenon