Maigret and the Beanstalk

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Maigret and the Beanstalk is a crime novel by the Belgian writer Georges Simenon , which was published in 1951 under the original title Maigret et la Grande Perche . It is the 38th novel in a series of 75 novels and 28 short stories about the detective Maigret . The novel was written from May 1 to May 8, 1951 on the Shadow Rock Farm in Lakeville , Connecticut , and was published on October 11 after a 12-part advance publication in the culture section of the magazine Les Nouvelles littéraires , n ° 1'258-1'269 Published by Presses de la Cité until December 27, 1951 in the same year .

The first German translation was published by Ernst Sander on KiWi in 1956 , on which the two German-language radio play adaptations from 1959 and 1961 were based. Guy Montag created a new translation for Diogenes Verlag in 1990 .

In the detective novel, the title hero Jules Maigret solves the murder of a dentist's wife thanks to the help of a former prostitute who is nicknamed “the beanpole”, although at the beginning there is not even a corpse.

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Quai des Orfèvres as seen from the Seine

The novel is set in the summer months of the early 1950s in Paris or its Neuilly suburb . On a midsummer Thursday, when Maigret and his colleagues were already suffering from the heat in the morning on the Quai des Orfèvres , the Commissioner received an unexpected visit.

Ernestine Jussiaume, known as the “beanpole” because of her stature, a former “easy girl” asks the inspector for help, because she has met him as an intelligent and trustworthy law enforcement officer. Ten years earlier he had unceremoniously had her wrapped naked in a tablecloth in the Rue de Lune by his prison beacons because she refused to appear at headquarters for an interrogation in a property crime and therefore did not want to dress. The way Maigret resolutely withdrew from the situation earned him the woman's respect. Ernestine is very worried about her husband Alfred, "the funeral lump".

The former employee of a safe company has been “working” on the “other side” on his own account for several years now, using his knowledge and skills to plunder his previous employer's safes, especially those that he built in years ago . One night when he was in his study breaking into the safe of the dentist Guilleaume Serre in Neuilly, the light of his flashlight fell on the face of a female corpse. In a panic, he flees the country by train so as not to be linked to the murder. He confesses to Ernestine only briefly by phone shortly before his departure from Gare du Nord by phone about what he had experienced. Since neither a missing person nor a murder case was reported to the inspector, Maigret has to question the information. In addition, no break-in reports were received, although the "funeral dump" had opened a window with the glass cutter. So Maigret makes his way to the Serres house to get an idea of ​​the possible case and initially only to follow the break-in.

In Neuilly he is welcomed in the rue de la Ferme by the mother of the landlord, an old lady of 75 years, who will certainly deny that they had been broken into. The window would have broken a week earlier in a storm, but was then restored by her son himself, who repairs everything in the house on his own. Serre himself is gruff and dismissive to the point of rudeness. When Maigret learns that his wife wanted to leave her husband forever that weekend, the investigator gradually suspects that there may be more to Ernestine's story. But both mother and son Serre emphasize that the separation took place by mutual consent - they even had dinner together before Monsieur Serre drove his wife to the train station in his car.

Maigret now learns the crucial next clues from the family's housemaid, Eugénie: The marriage between the native Dutchwoman Marie von Aerts and Guilliaume Serre was unhappy because of the cold feeling and the undisguised jealousy of the mother-in-law, Serre's first wife died of a heart attack at a young age , himself and Marie have heart problems, his own father also died of a heart attack when Guilliaume was in his teens . In both cases he inherited a not inconsiderable sum. Since further questioning of the residents and a house search did not reveal any further evidence of a murder, Maigret had the house observed and the Serres car in the garage was secretly examined by a forensic technician : But apart from conspicuous scratches from a heavy piece of luggage, nothing conspicuous was found . Thanks to a statement from an attentive neighbor, Maigret can prove that Monsieur Serre moved his car again that night. But the Commissioner's hands are still tied. Only the correspondence with Marie's closest friend in Amsterdam , Gertrude Coostine, and her further statements help him in two ways. In addition to many details, she tells him that Marie was in possession of a small pistol , which she would use if she had another fit of weakness because she was afraid that her mother-in-law would poison her. When Marie threatened her Madame Serre senior with this, she insisted through her son that the bullets must be removed from the gun. However, Marie had reserve ammunition with which she immediately reloaded the weapon.

The Pont de Neuilly near the Rue de la Ferme

When Maigret checked at the nearby household goods retailer whether Serre, who had an account there due to his numerous “do-it-yourself” work, had also purchased the materials on the day in question, he found that Serre did the same again a little later Must have repaired the window. When confronted with this, Serre buckles during interrogation at headquarters and initially claims that it was a matter of foreign exchange smuggling and tax evasion . Since the inspector is interrogating Madame Serre senior at the same time and exerting indirect pressure through an Ernestine placed in the witness room, Monsieur Serre wants to take the blame for Marie's death, but Maigret provokes his mother, who out of greed both her own husband and her daughters-in-law in order to remain the first and only woman in Guilliaume's life. Since Marie drew her weapon in self-defense and Monsieur shot her to protect his mother, this time the Serres were dealing with a corpse that could not be passed off as a natural death. Thus, her body was sunk inside the suitcase in the nearby Seine . However, as Maigret finally pointed out, Madame Serre Sr. had even considered giving her own son the wrong dose of heart medication during an interrogation break in order to keep himself safe. Her actual motive was therefore not motherly love , but greed .

Now that the murder has been solved, the "funeral lair" can come back to Paris. Thanks to Maigret, he doesn't have to fear further prosecution in this case, even if his Ernestine doubts that he will eventually give up his dream of a golden break-in.

background

Neuilly is a district of Paris where Rue de la Ferme runs parallel to Boulevard Richard-Wallace. Between 1936 and 1938 the writer Simenon rented an apartment on Boulevard Richard-Wallace, so he was familiar with the area. This boulevard also plays a role in Maigret and his Revolver (1952), as Maigret has a house search carried out there in an apartment.

The figure of the greedy old woman behind her amiable to elegant facade in the person of Madame Serre is reminiscent of Simenon's Valentine Besson in Maigret and the Old Lady (1950). The story begins with Maigret's description of the flight of a wasp . This flew in through the open room of his office. In Maigret's youth friend (1968) the commissioner also follows the flight of a fly with comparable dedication and concentration . Ernestine's introductory story about her friend Lulu and the theft is echoed in Maigret and the Terrible Children (1954), where the character of Thérèse has a similar story to tell. Alfred, the "silent thief" ("Il n'y en a pas un comme Alfred à Paris pour pénétrer sans bruit dans une maison habitée et pour y travailler sans seulement éveiller le chat.") Draws the characters of Grégoire Brau from Maigret and the unruly witnesses (1958) and those of Honoré Cuendet in Maigret and the lazy thief (1961). Eugénie is one of that long line of domestic workers who can always help Maigret with their information, such as the character of Désirée Brault in Hier errt Maigret (1953) or that of Madame Louise Bodin in Maigret and the Nahour case (1966).

review

For the reviewer of the German-language new translation, Tilman Spreckelsen , “Kommissar Zufall” played a surprisingly large role and the real villain of the story reveals both his own class and that of the commissioner: “If one of those interviewed by Maigret had not come again at the decisive moment Leafed through the accounts, then things would have turned out differently, Simenon expressly informs us; and although we know that the investigation of a crime in this cosmos by no means also means its punishment, and certainly not its legal processing, one accepts this turn with a certain gratitude. The villain of this book is simply too uncomfortable for that, he is stripped of all dignity at the end, especially the presumptuous dignity, and that manners sometimes mean the complete opposite of tact is shown here very nicely. Maigret is a proletarian through and through, it is said in an earlier case, and here you can guess why he remains so steadfast after many years of social advancement ”. Other reviews praised the surprising resolution and the feature that the focus here would be less on the description of the milieu than on the "Whodunit".

In connection with the radio play adaptations, the inherent calm of the cases described was praised: “The delightful thing about Simenon's works is the calm they radiate. Simenon has never written action crime novels. The narrative style resembles a slowly flowing river. Here the people involved have enough time to develop clearly before the eyes of the reader. "

expenditure

  • Maigret et la Grande Perche. Presses de la Cité, Paris 1951

Adaptations

Maigret as a sculpture in Delfzijl

Movie:

Radio play:

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Biographie de Georges Simenon 1946 à 1967 on Toutesimenon.com, the website of Omnibus Verlag.
  2. ↑ http://www.trussel.com/maig/plots/revplot.htm
  3. ↑ http://www.trussel.com/maig/plots/enfplot.htm
  4. ↑ http://www.trussel.com/maig/plots/ecoplot.htm
  5. ↑ http://www.trussel.com/maig/plots/templot.htm
  6. ↑ http://www.trussel.com/maig/plots/parplot.htm
  7. ↑ http://www.trussel.com/maig/plots/troplot.htm
  8. ↑ http://www.trussel.com/maig/plots/nahplot.htm
  9. ^ Tilman Spreckelsen: Maigret marathon 38th Maigret and the beanstalk. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . January 3, 2009. Retrieved June 24, 2012.
  10. ↑ http://www.krimi-couch.de/krimis/georges-simenon-maigret-und-die-bohnenstange.html
  11. ↑ http://www.meinebuecher.net/2011/05/georges-simenon-maigret-die-besten-falle/
  12. ↑ http://www.imdb.de/title/tt0639839/
  13. ↑ http://www.imdb.de/title/tt0394488/
  14. ↑ http://www.imdb.de/title/tt0102378/
  15. ↑ www.maigret.de
  16. ↑ Detailed information on www.hoerdat.in-berlin.de , accessed on June 24, 2012.
  17. ↑ Review of the radio play ( Memento from December 17, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) August 8, 2005. http://www.der-hoerwurm.de/