Maigret Defends Himself

by Georges Simenon

Book Overview

"A writer as comfortable with reality as with fiction, with passion as with reason." --John Le Carr

When suspicion turns on Inspector Maigret for a crime he did not commit, he must use every investigative tool in his arsenal to clear his name.

For the first time in his career, Inspector Maigret receives written summons to the Chief Commissioner's office. There he learns that he has been accused of a horrible assault...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0241304067
• ISBN13: 9780241304068
• Release Date: September 2019
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Length: 160 Pages
• Weight: 0.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.0" x 7.6"

Customer Reviews

Maigret at his dumbest & smartest

A young girl phones Maigret in the middle of the night begging for help. She's says she's been plied with booze and nearly seduced, and has fled in terror leaving her money behind. Maigret goes out and rescues her, putting her to bed overnight in an inexpensive hotel so she can sleep off her drunkenness. The next day he's summoned to the Chief Commissioner's office. There's been a complaint from a VIP that Maigret picked up the bigwig's niece in a bar, promised to show her an arrest, took her from bar to bar, got her drunk and finally seduced her. Maigret has been meticulously set up. The girl is just a pawn, of course, but who is the mastermind? And how will Maigret find out, since the Chief Commissioner forbids him to talk to the girl or investigate in any way? Maigret is on the wrong side of the law now. I found it hard to believe that Maigret would fall into such a dumb trap, but his cleverness in tracking down the culprit more than makes up for it. It's fascinating to observe Maigret's outrage and hurt feelings - and his fear that he's over the hill. Also, there's quite an interesting criminal for Maigret to trap in the end.

J'accuse!

One of the nice things about my last trip to New York was the fact that I had enough time to visit my favorite brick and mortar bookstore (on Broadway and 12th Street), a place filled with old and out-of-print books. I left with four old Inspector Maigret stories by Georges Simenon and started "Maigret on the Defensive" on the way home. Maigret is on the defensive because he has been accused by a young woman of an indecent assault on a young, innocent girl. The girl, Nicole Prieur, is the daughter of a highly placed government official. Maigret is summoned to the Commissioner's office. The Commissioner advises Maigret that the matter is being investigated, scoffs at Maigret's version of events, and suggests that Maigret submit his resignation before things get worse for him. As he prepares to leave the Commissioner prohibits Maigret from questioning his accuser and from mentioning the investigation to any of his colleagues. The most compelling aspect of "Maigret on the Defensive" is not the plot, which unfolds in Simenon's typical straightforward fashion, but the narrative's look at a man responding to an assault on his integrity and character. Written in 1964 it has been 33 years since the first Maigret story (the last was published in 1972) and Maigret is beginning to feel the weight of his years. He chafes at the antics of the new Commissioner, a political appointee with absolutely no knowledge of police work. He is annoyed at the insinuation that tactics he has used for 33 years (reliance on informers amongst them) are considered obsolete and unseemly by his superior. He is mortified and angry that after his long career that someone would accuse him of acting in an indecent manner. Most of all, he seems tired and a concerned that maybe, just maybe, time has passed him by. Fortunately for Maigret, his `men' (and Mrs. Maigret in her own quiet way) have no doubt that Maigret is innocent and go to great lengths to assist Maigret in getting to the facts behind the accusation. In the hands of a lesser writer this loyalty would seem trite and more than a bit forced. In the hands of Simenon, it seems entirely natural. I admit to being a fan of Simenon. To say he was prolific would be an understatement. He wrote over 100 Maigret stories and at least 100 other books. But he was never prolix. For all the books he wrote a reader would be hard pressed to find an unnecessary sentence. His writing is sparse, not effusive, and he never felt the need to over dramatize his characters. The emotions were all inferred and left to the reader to discover. He didn't bang you over the head with it. "Maigret on the Defensive" is a good example of the `essential' Simenon. Recommended. L. Fleisig

The unthinkable - Maigret accused of horrible wrong-doing.

A more accurate translation of the original might be 'Maigret defends himself', and in this late, autumnal Simenon, we find a hero three years away from retirement, a man who should be lounging on the laurels of a remarkably successful career, accused of getting the orphaned teenage niece of an important state official drunk and taking her to a cheap hotel. There is no real mystery or ambiguity in such a scenario - the idea of a lecherous Maigret is about as plausible as Sherlock Holmes in a Santa suit. As ever with Simenon, the interest is psychological, and Maigret's near-breakdown is superbly conveyed, in the fragmented and delayed way the accusation is given to the reader, disorienting us as much as the detective; and in the way Maigret looks at the world, the interrogator now interrogted, decades of integrity and achievement counting for nothing. There is a brilliant scene after Maigret has been condescendingly accused by an upstart Chief Commissioner in a large, unfamiliar, anonymous office; the sense of literal and spiritual depletion he feels in this silent, cavernous building opens out onto the heightened colour and noise of the streets as he leaves.'Defensive' is a classic study of middle-age; of the generational conflicts that take place in any large organisation, when the old methods are despised by arrogant young bucks; of the touching, unspoken, nearly-sentimental companionship of trusted old (male) colleagues; of the moral ambiguity of a law-enforcement so dependent on informers; of Paris in broiling summer, devoid of inane romanticism. The most endearing thing about Maigret, alone among the great detectives, is his serene, bourgeois domesticsity, and the moral support given by the wonderful Mme. Maigret may not win many feminist admirers, but is touching nonetheless. A lesser writer might have contrasted this normality with the vicious sexuality that poisons the world outside, and nearly destroys the Superintendent, but both Simenon and Maigret are defined by their tolerance and understanding. Mystery-wise, 'Defensive' seems as slack and shambling as a middle-aged inebriate, and hopelessly old-fashioned for 1964; it is actually as rigorously constructed and thematically thoughtful as we expect from this great writer.