" La plus mauvaise plaisanterie jouée à Joseph Leborgne avait été de l'appeler ainsi, car il portait son nom aussi mal que possible. C'était un homme de trente-cinq ans environ, plutôt petit et mince, extrêmement soigné. Il avait horreur des complications de la vie au point qu'il s'obstinait, étant célibataire, à vivre à l'hôtel, où il se faisait le plus souvent servir ses repas dans sa chambre. " Cette série de 13 enquêtes, écrite 21 place des Vosges à Paris, durant l'hiver 1928-1929, met en scène un détective amateur, Joseph Leborgne, personnage énigmatique dont on ne sait rien jusqu'au dernier mystère, "La tabatière en or", dans lequel le lecteur fait plus ample connaissance avec lui. Ces nouvelles sont prépubliées dans l'hebdomadaire Détective du 21 mars au 27 juin 1929 (nos 21 à 35) sous le pseudonyme de Georges Sim dans le cadre d'un concours hebdomadaire dans lequel chaque nouvelle, suivie des questions du concours, est publiée dans un premier numéro, et le dénouement dans un numéro ultérieur. Simenon en numérique : les enquêtes du célèbre commissaire Maigret, les très "noirs' Romans durs et les nouvelles.
Author
Georges Joseph Christian Simenon (1903 – 1989) was a Belgian writer. A prolific author who published nearly 500 novels and numerous short works, Simenon is best known as the creator of the fictional detective Jules Maigret. Although he never resided in Belgium after 1922, he remained a Belgian citizen throughout his life. Simenon was one of the most prolific writers of the twentieth century, capable of writing 60 to 80 pages per day. His oeuvre includes nearly 200 novels, over 150 novellas, several autobiographical works, numerous articles, and scores of pulp novels written under more than two dozen pseudonyms. Altogether, about 550 million copies of his works have been printed. He is best known, however, for his 75 novels and 28 short stories featuring Commissaire Maigret. The first novel in the series, Pietr-le-Letton, appeared in 1931; the last one, Maigret et M. Charles, was published in 1972. The Maigret novels were translated into all major languages and several of them were turned into films and radio plays. Two television series (1960-63 and 1992-93) have been made in Great Britain. During his "American" period, Simenon reached the height of his creative powers, and several novels of those years were inspired by the context in which they were written (Trois chambres à Manhattan (1946), Maigret à New York (1947), Maigret se fâche (1947)). Simenon also wrote a large number of "psychological novels", such as La neige était sale (1948) or Le fils (1957), as well as several autobiographical works, in particular Je me souviens (1945), Pedigree (1948), Mémoires intimes (1981). In 1966, Simenon was given the MWA's highest honor, the Grand Master Award. In 2005 he was nominated for the title of De Grootste Belg (The Greatest Belgian). In the Flemish version he ended 77th place. In the Walloon version he ended 10th place.
