The inn in Alsace
The Gasthaus in Alsace is a novel by Georges Simenon and was published as one of Simenon's first non-Maigret novels. The original edition appeared in 1931 under the title Le relais d`Alsace by Fayard, the German edition for the first time in 1935 under the title Nachtnebel by the Schlesische Verlagsanstalt in the translation by Harold Effberg. In 1986 the Diogenes Verlag in Zurich published a new translation by Angela von Hagen under the title Das Gasthaus im Alsaß .
content
A certain Monsieur Serge has been living in a small inn in Alsace , the Relais-d'Alsace at the Col de la Schlucht, for months and leads a quiet life there. One day the landlady asked him about the outstanding payment of 3,000 francs; Monsieur Serge then said that he would get the money by the next day. Then his roommate, the wealthy Monsieur Van de Laer, suddenly loses his money. You look for someone to blame, and he is quickly found: Monsieur Serge; so the investigation is focused on him and the hurried inspector Mercier is pretty sure to have caught the thief quickly.
But Serge does not give up easily: he shows the crime scene and proves that it couldn't have been him. The demonstration he gave Mercier and the Van de Lears was so convincing that, despite his non-existent alibi and the fact that no one still knew where he got his money from, they had nothing against him . However, then came the time when the theft no longer counted. Someone noticed that Monsieur Serge was very similar to the descriptions of the internationally wanted fraudster Commodore . For him, and only for him, Commissioner Labbé sets out to the small Alsatian town.
background
When the first two Maigret novels appeared in February 1931 - Maigret and the late Monsieur Gallet and Maigret and the Hanged Man of Saint-Pholien - these were the first works that Georges Simenon published under his own name. Before that, he had written penny novels for years under numerous pseudonyms. Despite the success of the Maigret series, Simenon wanted to develop into serious literature and wrote non-Maigret novels on the side without his famous commissioner. According to Simenon's biographer Patrick Marnham, the first two attempts - Das Gasthaus im Alsace and The Passenger of the Polarlys - were still largely in the genre of the crime novel .
expenditure
- Georges Simenon: Le relais d`Alsace . Paris, Fayard 1931 (first edition).
- Georges Simenon: Night Fog . Berlin, Schlesische Verlagsanstalt 1935 (translation: Harold Effberg)
- Georges Simenon: The inn in Alsace . Zurich, Diogenes 1986 (t: Angela von Hagen)
Radio play version
A radio play version was released in 2006 as a production by SWR Freiburg. The speakers included Christian Redl , Rüdiger Vogler , Dieter Mann and Cathy Dingler .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Patrick Marnham: The Man Who Wasn't Maigret. The life of Georges Simenon. Knaus, Berlin 1995, ISBN 3-8135-2208-3 .
- ↑ http://www.hoerspielkrimi.net/archiv/g/gasthausimelsassdas.htm