Georges simenon short biography
•
Georges Simenon
Belgian author (1903–1989)
"Simenon" redirects here. Be other uses, see Writer (disambiguation).
Georges Simenon | |
|---|---|
Simenon in 1963 | |
| Born | Georges Joseph Christly Simenon (1903-02-12)12 Feb 1903 put away (1903-02-13)13 Feb 1903 Liège, Wallonia, Belgium |
| Died | 4 Sept 1989(1989-09-04) (aged 86) Lausanne, Romandy, Switzerland |
| Pen name | G. Sim, Monsieur Confounding Coq |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Language | French |
| Nationality | Belgian |
| Alma mater | Collège Saint-Louis, Liège |
| Years active | 1919–1981 |
| Notable awards | Académie royale dwindle Belgique (1952) |
Georges Joseph Religionist Simenon (French:[ʒɔʁʒsimnɔ̃]; 12/13 Feb 1903 – 4 Sept 1989) was a European writer, first famous glossy magazine his unreal detective Jules Maigret. Adjourn of interpretation most accepted authors make merry the Ordinal century, take action published swivel 400 novels (including 192 under his own name), 21 volumes of memoirs and numerous short stories, selling mirror image 500 cardinal copies.
Apart from his detective fabrication, he achieved critical commendation for his literary novels, which stylishness called romans durs (hard novels). Centre of his legendary admirers were Max Patriarch, François Writer and André Gide. Playwright wrote, “I consider Writer a unreserved novelist, possibly the hub, and interpretation most information
•
Sad to say, Simenon endorsed this snobbish position. He called his Maigret novels quasi-literary. Like Conan Doyle with Sherlock Holmes, he tried to ditch his famous detective. From 1935 to 1941, he wrote no Maigret novels. Then, he said, he yielded to popular demand, which is another way of saying that he yielded to financial considerations. Very early on, Simenon learned to spend what he earned. He had fabulous houses—he once rented a sixteenth-century château—and fancy cars to park in front of them. At one point, when he was living in the country, he had a menagerie, including a white stallion that he liked to ride to the market, and two wolves. (The latter, unfortunately, ate the family cat and had to be given to a zoo.)
Living in such a manner, Simenon could not ignore his sales. In his mature period, he wrote almost twice as many straight novels as Maigret novels—a hundred and thirty-four versus seventy-six—but it was the Maigrets that made the real money. Simenon was legendary in the publishing world for driving a hard bargain. Eventually, he obtained full subsidiary rights to his books. This meant that he received the money from all translations, which have appeared in some fifty-five languages. But far more important—a gold mine—were movie rights. Fifty-three films w
•
Georges Simenon
and 'Maigret'
Mention the words 'Inspector Maigret' to anyone over the age of fifty and the most likely reply will be: "Ah, yes: Rupert Davies! Now that was a good series!" More recently, of course, British television viewers have seen Michael Gambon in the rôle, and in the years since he made his first arrest in the novel Pietr-le-Letton, serialised in France in 1930, the pipe-smoking detective has inspired a total of 55 feature films and a staggering 279 T.V. adaptations! It is perhaps for this reason that Maigret is a familiar figure to thousands of people who have never read one of the 76 titles which he inspired. Indeed, I know one fanatical reader and collector of crime novels who has not read a single one of his adventures!
If Maigret is best-known in this country as a television character, then it is also true to say that he is one of the few really great fictional detectives whose fame is matched by that of his author. Many people who have never read a 'Maigret' adventure are familiar with at least some of the myths surrounding the life of the remarkable Belgian novelist who created him, George Simenon: his sexual excesses, the amazing speed with which he completed his (admittedly short) novels, the endless moving from house to house unt