Patrick Marnham

A salute to Georges Simenon

Patrick Marnham praises Penguin Classics for republishing the Maigret novels

Georges Simenon aged 30 (left) and Jean Gabin (right) in the 1958 film Maigret Tend un Piège — to be shown as part of a season of Maigret films at the Barbican, London (4–26 October). For details visit www.barbican.org.uk. [Mary Evans picture library/ Getty Images] 
issue 20 September 2014

One hundred years ago an 11-year-old boy called Georges Simenon was getting accustomed to the presence of the German army in Liège. Together with his mother and his younger brother he had been forced to hide in the cellar of their terraced house on the island of Outremeuse to avoid the firing squads.

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