Maigret gets angry

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Maigret falls into anger (French: La colère de Maigret ) is a crime novel by the Belgian writer Georges Simenon . It is the 61st novel in a series of 75 novels and 28 short stories about the detective inspector Maigret . The novel was written in Echandens from June 13 to 19, 1962 and was published in 21 episodes by the French daily Le Figaro from June 28 to July 22 of the following year . The book was published in the fourth quarter of 1963 by the Paris publisher Presses de la Cité . The first German translation by Hansjürgen Wille and Barbara Klau was published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch in 1964 as Maigret is angry . In 1979 the Diogenes Verlag published a new translation by Wolfram Schäfer under the title Maigret gets into anger .

When the owner of several striptease bars disappears, everything looks like a reckoning for Inspector Maigret in the Parisian red light district around Place Pigalle . Only weeks earlier, the head of a Corsican gang of criminals had been shot in the street. But the diligent business conduct of the disappeared and his good family life do not fit the picture of a seedy milieu. The investigation finally brings unimagined backgrounds to light that make Maigret angry.

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Rue Victor-Massé in the 9th arrondissement of Paris

It is June 12 in Paris , and there is a holiday mood on the Quai des Orfèvres when the Italian Antonio Farano reports his brother-in-law Émile Boulay missing. Boulay owns a chain of nightclubs on Montmartre and the Champs-Élysées . But the former steward, in his humble, hard-working demeanor, does not at all correspond to the cliché of the red light district. He lives with his wife Marina, his sister-in-law Ada and his Italian mother-in-law under one roof on Rue Victor-Massé, without ever having an affair with a striptease dancer. Every evening he takes care of the clubs himself and leaves the financial business to the sleazy accountant Jules Raison.

The only clue to Boulay's disappearance appears to be the death of the Corsican gang leader Mazotti. He was shot a month ago after trying unsuccessfully to extort protection money . As a result, Inspector Lucas interrogated various milieus, including Boulay several times, but without any result. The bouncer and police spy Louis “Mickey” Boubée confirms to Maigret that Mazotti's death had nothing to do with the nightclub owner, but was the result of a reckoning among gangsters. Boulay, on the other hand, was found strangled in the Père Lachaise cemetery after two days , and neither the manner of death nor the late disposal of the corpses indicate a professional act in the criminal environment.

The investigation brings little evidence to light: weeks before his death, Boulay had withdrawn the unusually high sum of 5,000 francs. And on the evening of the crime he tried nervously repeatedly to get a telephone connection before finally going down Rue Pigalle without reaching his club there. When Maigret learns that Boulay's lawyer Jean-Charles Gaillard resides in the branching off Rue La Bruyère, he comes under suspicion. But the superintendent doubts his intuition, because while he has heard of angry clients killing their lawyer, he has no idea the reverse.

Maître Gaillard seems to do extremely good business with a small clientele, although it is noticeable that he only accepts light cases in which he can easily obtain an acquittal or a suspended sentence for his client. The attorney's machinations come to light through the interrogation of the car thief Gaston Mauran. Allegedly in order to bribe the police and the judiciary , Gaillard regularly takes large sums of money from his clients, which he is actually putting in his own pocket, since the cases are easy to win anyway. Maigret gets angry when he learns that the lawyer has even presented the inspector as for sale.

Worried that the investigation into Mazotti's murder could have a negative impact on his business, Boulay allowed his lawyer to trick him into paying a bribe of 5,000 francs. When Inspector Lucas repeatedly summoned him to the quay, the nervous nightclub owner complained to Gaillard about the lack of consideration. He killed his mandate so that his dirty business would not be exposed, but was only able to dispose of the body two days later because his car had to be repaired. Although the angry Maigret has vowed not to be softened by the criminal lawyer, he feels pity when the latter confesses his two passions: the once dearly loved, but now mentally ill wife and the gambling addiction that he uses to his unhappy private life escaped. When the superintendent learns of the lawyer's suicide in his prison cell, his feelings once again erupt in an outburst.

interpretation

A reader of Maigret gets angry , according to Oliver Hahn, wondering about the whole novel: “Is he angry now? No, angry, but not angry. ”But since“ empty promises in the title ”are not Simenon's kind,“ something has to come ”. In fact, it wasn't until the very end of the novel that the title-giving outburst of anger occurred when Maigret found out about the rumor of his corruption, which was only launched to do business with it. In the confrontation with the lawyer, he can hardly contain himself not to beat him. Stanley G. Eskin sees this as the superintendent's biggest tantrum in the Maigret series. However, Maigret, commonly associated with compassion and understanding, is capable of outbursts of anger and indignation in other novels as well. Tilman Spreckelsen describes the inspector as "sensitive when it comes to his honor, at least more sensitive than his sedate stature would suggest." In addition, the diagnosis of his doctor, Dr. Pardon to curb his alcohol consumption, which makes him “neither more relaxed nor better as an investigator”. In any case, Maigret is enraged simply “a nice title for a novel”.

Because of the location of Montmartre, Murielle Wenger feels reminded of an earlier novel in the series, in which Maigret also dives into the world of nightclubs and striptease bars: Maigret and the Dancer . Another bouncer makes his appearance here with the “grasshopper”, who not only reminds of the dwarfish Louis “Mickey” Boubée. According to Detlef Richter, Maigret's walks through the entertainment district around Place Pigalle give the reader “a deep insight into the soul of this Parisian area.” However, the murder victim does not seem to fit into this milieu: a quiet businessman and an honest family man in his well-organized life there was no room for unforeseen events. When searching for his murderer, Maigret repeats the same sentence over and over again , like a leitmotif : "A lawyer does not kill his clients." Even if Maigret finds it difficult to get used to the idea that Boulay's lawyer is also his murderer , lawyers in general do not get off well in the corpus of the series, which in Maigret and the crime in Holland and Maigret with the Flemish even extends to law students. The Le vieux Garçon inn , which Maigret and his wife have been visiting for twenty years, is reminiscent of another early novel, Maigret und die kleine Landkneipe . In any case, Madame Maigret was demonstratively not jealous of the novel when her husband was hanging out with the girls at Pigalle, and she also magnanimously overlooked his treacherous alcohol flag at the end.

reception

Maigret has good reason for his anger , according to the American magazine The Critic . After all, the reputation of the Paris police is at stake. “Chief Inspector Maigret solves the case and clears up the mess in his typical way. There is no one like Maigret and almost every Maigret adventure is rewarding. "In the novel, Books and Bookmen found a moody Maigret, whose hatchery under the June heat and his damaged sense of justice discharges in a dangerous outburst:" Usually he feels pity when he finally does cornered his husband, but this time it's different. ”For The Spectator , Simenon designs an unusual type in the novel:“ a middle-class nightclub owner who is loyal, homely and conscientious in business ”, so that he lives in the underworld Nicknamed "Chandler". “Maigret's deep understanding of Montmartre helps him solve a baffling murder.” The American magazine Best Sellers rated: “This really is an enigmatic murder, and Maigret's almost obsessive interest in the case makes it as exciting as any of the better Maigret stories . ” Publishers Weekly's verdict was short and sweet:“ a superb 'Maigret' ”.

For Tilman Spreckelsen, on the other hand , Maigret was in rage a "wingless novel, [...] a little tough, a little forced". You can hear it "crunch in the structure of this book, [...] the will to deceive the reader through wrong tracks is more open here than ever". In addition, Simenon describes a "not particularly well-lit milieu" with belittling family scenes. Detlef Richter judged differently: "This band also shines because of the detailed, atmospheric descriptions". In describing the nocturnal hustle and bustle around the Pigalle, Simenon “again attached great importance to an authentic representation of the scenes. And he succeeds almost perfectly. ”His conclusion was:“ Pure atmosphere and a Maigret in top form await the crime fanatic. ”Carsten Friedrichs from the music group Superpunk counted Maigret in anger among“ Simenon's all-time classics ”.

The novel was filmed twice as part of television series. After a Japanese television film with Kinya Aikawa from 1978, Jean Richard played the commissioner in the French television series Les Enquêtes du Commissaire Maigret in 1983 .

expenditure

  • Georges Simenon: La colère de Maigret . Presses de la Cité, Paris 1963 (first edition).
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret is angry . Translation: Hansjürgen Wille, Barbara Klau. Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 1964.
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret is angry . Translation: Hansjürgen Wille, Barbara Klau. Heyne, Munich 1969.
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret gets angry . Translation: Wolfram Schäfer. Diogenes, Zurich 1979, ISBN 3-257-21113-9 .
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret gets angry . Complete Maigret novels in 75 volumes, volume 61. Translation: Wolfram Schäfer. Diogenes, Zurich 2009, ISBN 978-3-257-23861-7 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Biographie de Georges Simenon 1946 à 1967 on Toutesimenon.com, the website of Omnibus Verlag.
  2. ↑ La colère de Maigret in the Simenon bibliography by Yves Martina.
  3. ↑ Oliver Hahn: Bibliography of German-language editions . In: Georges-Simenon-Gesellschaft (Ed.): Simenon-Jahrbuch 2003 . Wehrhahn, Laatzen 2004, ISBN 3-86525-101-3 , pp. 57-58.
  4. ↑ Maigret gets angry at maigret.de.
  5. ↑ Josef Quack: The limits of the human. About Georges Simenon, Rex Stout, Friedrich Glauser, Graham Greene . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2000, ISBN 3-8260-2014-6 , p. 55.
  6. ^ Stanley G. Eskin: Simenon. A biography . Diogenes, Zurich 1989, ISBN 3-257-01830-4 , pp. 399-400.
  7. ↑ a b c Tilman Spreckelsen: Maigret Marathon 61: Maigret is upset . On FAZ.net from June 26, 2009.
  8. ↑ a b Maigret of the Month: La colère de Maigret (Maigret Loses His Temper) on Steve Trussel's Maigret page.
  9. ↑ a b Maigret gets angry (Georges Simenon); Volume 61 on leser-welt.de .
  10. ^ Georges Simenon: Maigret gets angry . Complete Maigret novels in 75 volumes, volume 61. Translation: Wolfram Schäfer. Diogenes, Zurich 2009, ISBN 978-3-257-23861-7 , p. 152.
  11. ^ "Chief Superintendent Maigret solves the murder and clears up the mess in characteristic fashion. There is nobody like Maigret and almost every Maigret adventure is rewarding. "Quoted from: The Critic Volume 32, 1973, p. 77.
  12. ↑ "usually he is quite sorry, when he at last corners his man, but this one is different." Quoted from: Books and Bookmen Volume 10. Hanson Books, 1964, p. 37.
  13. ↑ "Simenon describes an uncommon type, a bourgeois night-club ownerSimenon describes an uncommon type, a bourgeois night-club owner, who is uxorious, home-loving and scrupulous about business. [...] Maigret's deep understanding of Montmartre helps him to solve an intriguing murder. Maigret's deep understanding of Montmartre helps him to solve an intriguing murder. ”Quoted from: The Spectator Volume 214, 1965, p. 305.
  14. ↑ "It is surely a baffling murder and Maigret's almost obsessive concern about the case makes this as suspenseful as any of the other better Maigret stories." Quoted from: Best Sellers: From the United States Government Printing Office , Volume 33, 1973, p 523.
  15. ↑ "A superb 'Maigret'". Quoted from: Publishers Weekly Volume 205, Part 1, 1974, p. 21.
  16. ↑ René Martens: The world is sausage ( Memento of the original from February 10, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / jungle-world.com archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . In: Jungle World No. 15, April 4, 2001.
  17. ↑ Maigret Films & TV on Steve Trussel's Maigret page.