Maigret and his rival

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Maigret and his rival ( French L'Inspecteur Cadavre ) is a crime novel by the Belgian writer Georges Simenon . It is the 24th novel in a series of 75 novels and 28 short stories about the detective inspector Maigret . The novel was completed on March 3, 1943 in Saint-Mesmin in the Vendée department and published in January 1944 together with Maigret contra Picpus and Maigret and the maid in the anthology Signé Picpus at the Editions Gallimard . The first German translation by Hansjürgen Wille and Barbara Klau was published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch in 1962 . In 1987 the Diogenes Verlag published a new translation by Ingrid Altrichter.

At the request of an examining magistrate, Commissioner Maigret travels to the Vendée department in order to relieve his brother-in-law by conducting a semi-official investigation. The village rumors link the wealthy landowner to the death of a young boy who is said to have had an affair with his daughter. On arrival, the Parisian commissioner met a former colleague whose reunion he was anything but happy about. The ex-policeman known to everyone only as "Inspector Cadavre" now earns his living as a private detective. In the investigation, he becomes Maigret's rival.

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Panorama of Niort

It is a cold, wet January, and Maigret is officially investigating in Saint-Aubin-les-Marais, near Niort in the Vendée. The examining magistrate Victor Bréjon has asked him to stand by his brother-in-law Étienne Naud against threatened charges. Rumors circulate in the village that the wealthy landowner was to blame for the death of young Albert Retailleau, who was found lifeless on the train tracks near his estate. The Paris commissioner must realize that his reputation has not reached the remote village, where he is met with silence and hostility. A small group of rebels, led by Louis Fillou, a friend of the dead man, accuse the stranger of having been bought by the rich anyway. Otherwise nobody wants to talk to the guest or to know more about Albert's death, even his mother, who seems to have surprisingly made money, shows no interest in the explanation. And the Nauds, too, are not very happy about the unexpected help from Paris. Her daughter Geneviève sneaks into Maigret's room at night to confide in him that Retailleau has made her pregnant. She threatens to kill herself if the inspector betrays her.

Angry Maigret is on the verge of giving up the investigation and simply leaving again if it hadn't been for a rival. Justin Cavre, known as "Inspector Cadavre", was a former colleague of Maigrets on the Quai des Orfèvres before he had to quit his job due to irregularities and opened an office as a private detective. Maigret has never liked the intelligent loner, who is full of distrust and hatred of his fellow men. This does not change when he meets Cavre again in Saint-Aubin-les-Marais, of all places, and the private detective is always a decisive step ahead of his former colleague in the investigation. His presence and arrogant demeanor fuel the ambition of the Paris commissioner.

Maigret also discovers Inspector Cadavre, of all people, when one evening he gains uninvited access to the villa of Alban Groult-Cotelles, the Nauds family friend, who is a run-down aristocrat with no real task. Maigret learns that Naud is the private detective's client, and as soon as he is out of the house, he can overhear two phone calls in which Cavre and Groult-Cotelle Naud warn of Maigret's investigation, and the man who then warned his confused brother-in-law, the examining magistrate Bréjon, Urges Maigret to be recalled to Paris immediately.

However, when Étienne Naud was questioned, he was not able to withstand Maigret's perseverance for long. He collapses crying and admits that it was he who killed Albert Retailleau. That night he heard a loud argument in the room of his daughter Geneviève and there he discovered the young man who fled, being pursued by his father, who was indignant and worried about his daughter's innocence. When Naud asked him, Albert did not ask his forgiveness, as expected, but rather insulted Geneviève and the whole Naud family with such filthy insults that Naud killed him in an outburst and then dragged him to the train tracks. He then confided in only one person: his friend Groult-Cotelle. He suppressed the rumors that were sprouting up in the village with hush money, and he also got Retailleau's mother on his side with generous compensation. Finally, he hired the private detective Cavre to remove incriminating evidence such as the dead man's cap.

Although the crime has been solved, Maigret does not believe that Naud is the real culprit for the tragedy, which an intimate exchange of gaze between Geneviève and Groult-Cotelle revealed to him. He summons the family friend and Inspector Cadavre and brings to light that the aristocrat, who lives apart from his wife, once seduced young Geneviève and has been her lover ever since. When the girl became pregnant, he wanted to shirk his responsibility and asked Geneviève to hang the child on a boy from the village. The choice fell on Albert Retailleau, who believed in Geneviève's feigned love for a few months until he understood that the child was only supposed to be foisted on him, whereupon he confronted his bride. The subsequent argument with the father Naud survived only one of two furious men. The cowardly Groult-Cotelle, on the other hand, suspected in advance that a misfortune was imminent that evening, and traveled away in order to be able to show a safe alibi.

For Maigret, the Nauds are punished enough that they have no choice but to leave their homeland to escape the smoldering rumors. When he arrived, he and his rival Cadavre left without publicly investigating the crime, which in the eyes of the young Louis Fillou merely confirmed his corruption. Years later, Maigret heard that Étienne Naud had become a cattle breeder in Argentina, and Groult-Cotelle, divorced at the instigation of the Commissioner, had to face up to his responsibilities and married his lover Geneviève in South America.

background

During the Second World War , Georges Simenon and his family lived mainly in the south-western part of France, first in Fontenay-le-Comte , and from October 1942 in a villa in the village of Saint-Mesmin in the Vendée department . There he finished the autobiographical novel Pedigree (German: family tree ) and five other novels, including The Flight of Monsieur Monde . Maigret and His Rival was the only Maigret novel of this period. The fictional setting Saint-Aubin-les-Marais is also located in the Vendée. Simenon located him between Fontenay-le-Comte and Niort , near the municipality of Benet .

Between Maigret and his rival and the previously created novel Maigret and the maid lie around 10 months and the move to Saint-Mesmin. However, the novels are completely different in tone and atmosphere. Maigret and the maid is set in spring in a growing new settlement near Paris. The story seems happy and lively and mainly revolves around the dalliance between Maigret and the maid. Maigret and his rival shows a traditional rural way of life that has evolved over generations and seems unchangeable, and the plot in the wintry Vendée is much darker, more threatening and more complex. The contrast between the two novels can also be seen in the different usage of the saying “everything is going back to normal”. In Maigret and the Maid, Maigret comforted the desperate maid with compassion with these words. In Maigret and his rival , on the other hand, he criticizes such flimsy consolation and speaks of a horrible "phrase that makes me wince and grind my teeth every time I hear it".

interpretation

According to its title Maigret and his rival , the novel for Murielle Wenger is all about the rivalry between the Paris detective and the former inspector. The competition between the two different characters is like a game of hide-and-seek, in which Cadavre Maigret is always one step ahead, and Maigret's actions are sometimes conditioned by the presence of his rival . Tilman Spreckelsens sees Cadavre on the scale between witty figure and dark twin: so ridiculous that no one can confuse him with the famous commissioner, he nevertheless ensures at the beginning that the master does not find the case and feels as if he is not at all Maigret. The commissioner already believes in a "triumph of the unfortunate, the unfortunate, the jealous" and wants to break off the investigations, but in the end he opposes Cadavre's destruction of traces with his own method, which is not based on evidence but on understanding for the people involved . In doing so, he robs the former inspector of his self-confidence and unintentionally arouses his admiration. In the end Maigret feels pity for his rival, who, with his innate distrust, his pessimism and his hatred of people, embodies the exact opposite of Maigret, who despite all negative experiences always maintains a basic trust in humanity, in which, according to Wenger, he his creator Simenon resemble.

Paul Bailey , on the other hand, does not see the rivalry between Maigret and Cadavre at the center of the novel, but rather the "polluted soul" of the decrepit aristocrat Groult-Cotelle, whose worthlessness is constantly brought before the reader's eyes. The novel paints a picture of rural snobbery and hypocrisy, as well as of the unbridgeable gap between peasants and rural nobility. Two young people fall victim to the corrupt and degrading milieu in different ways: Albert and Louis, who in the end is left alone with his rebellion. In solving the case, Louis becomes not only the leader of the Paris commissioner, to whom he opens doors and mouths that would otherwise have remained closed to him. Maigret even has to admit that he is the pockmarked boy who is actually driving the investigation with the joke of his youth. For Tilman Spreckelsen, Maigret only becomes the master of the investigation when he fraternises with the local proletarians . Stanley G. Eskin also sees the novel, which is peppered with references to the workers' unrest of the 1930s, awakening Maigret and Simenon's class consciousness , whereby Maigret's sympathy is always aimed at the "little people" and directed against the depravity of the upper class. At the end of the novel, Maigret turns out to be the well-known "fateful flicker" who intervenes in the lives of the people involved. He causes the perpetrator to go into exile and the cowardly aristocrat to divorce so that his young mistress can later marry. For Murielle Wenger, Maigret's special idea of ​​punishment lies in the permanent marriage of the unequal pair of lovers.

reception

For the New Yorker , the Maigret novel from the classic era of the series provided entertainment that went beyond the mere presence of the commissioner and his original idea of ​​justice and the resolution of the case. It lies in the description of a village that is dominated by the question of voting, the mutual relationships and the pride of a family that is above everything. In addition, there is bad weather, country cuisine and drinks in abundance. Kirkus Reviews judged Maigret and his rival : "Très gentil." It is a "reserved but very charming" classic with a pretty puzzle that is accompanied by the description of a narrow-minded French village.

While Tilman Spreckelsen simply spoke of a “fabulous novel”, Josef Quack drew a comparison with high literature and saw some passages “ interwoven with reflections in the style of Proust , which deal with flashy memories or the peculiarity of dreams”. Stanley G. Eskin, however, did not count Maigret and his rival among the best novels of the Gallimard period and found Maigret and the maid to be “considerably more enjoyable”. Art Bourgeau's conclusion was somewhat surprising: "This book is as funny as Simenon can be."

The novel was filmed twice as part of TV series about Commissioner Maigret. Jean Richard (France, 1968) and Bruno Cremer (France, 1998) played the title role .

expenditure

  • Georges Simenon: L'Inspecteur Cadavre . In: Signé Picpus . Presses de la Cité, Paris 1944 (first edition).
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret and his rival . Translation: Hansjürgen Wille and Barbara Klau. Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 1962.
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret and his rival . Translation: Hansjürgen Wille and Barbara Klau. Heyne, Munich 1968.
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret and his rival . Translation: Ingrid Altrichter. Diogenes, Zurich 1987, ISBN 3-257-21523-1 .
  • Georges Simenon: Maigret and his rival . All Maigret novels in 75 volumes, volume 24. Translation: Ingrid Altrichter. Diogenes, Zurich 2008, ISBN 978-3-257-23824-2 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Biographie de Georges Simenon 1924 à 1945 on Toutesimenon.com, the website of the Omnibus Verlag.
  2. ^ L'inspecteur Cadavre in the bibliography by Yves Martina.
  3. ↑ Oliver Hahn: Bibliography of German-language editions . Georges-Simenon-Gesellschaft (Ed.): Simenon-Jahrbuch 2003 . Wehrhahn, Laatzen 2004, ISBN 3-86525-101-3 , p. 73.
  4. ↑ a b Maigret of the Month: L'Inspecteur Cadavre (Maigret's Rival) on Steve Trussel's Maigret page.
  5. ↑ Georges Simenon: Maigret and his rival . Diogenes, Zurich 2008, ISBN 978-3-257-23824-2 , p. 197.
  6. ↑ 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. 50.
  7. ↑ a b c Maigret and his collaborators by Murielle Wenger on Steve Trussel's website.
  8. ↑ a b c Tilman Spreckelsen: Maigret Marathon 24: His rival . On FAZ.net from September 29, 2008.
  9. ^ Paul Bailey : Introduction to the Penguin edition by Inspector Cadaver .
  10. ^ A b Stanley G. Eskin: Simenon. A biography . Diogenes, Zurich 1989, ISBN 3-257-01830-4 , p. 251.
  11. ↑ 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. 58.
  12. ↑ “This is vintage (1943) Maigret, which means that it holds pleasures beyond the presence of the great man, his usually original ideas of justice, and the solution of the case at hand. The pleasures here are the depiction (offhand but telling) of the village and its preoccupation with lineage, the interrelarionships that render one man acceptable and another not, the pride of family that stands above all else. There is also plenty of bad weather, an abundance of good provincial cooking, and all the drink you could ask for. ”In: The New Yorker Volume 56, Part 3, 1980, p. 164.
  13. ↑ "low-key, high-charm vintage (1944) Maigret […] a neat puzzle even more neatly backed by Simenon's unadorned picture of an insular French village. Très gentil. ”In: Maigret's Rival by Georges Simenon on Kirkus Reviews.
  14. ↑ 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. 49.
  15. ↑ "This book is as funny as Simenon gets." In: Art Bourgeau: The mystery lover's companion . Crown, New York 1986, ISBN 0-517-55602-2 , p. 302.
  16. ↑ Maigret and his rival on maigret.de.