Maigret and the Headless Corpse: Inspector Maigret

Inspector Maigret #47

by Georges Simenon, Howard Curtis (Translation)

'The new crime and espionage series from Penguin Classics makes for a mouth-watering prospect' Daily Telegraph


A baffling case. A mysterious inheritance.
It starts when a man's arm is fished out of Paris's Canal Saint-Martin. Then the rest of the body is retrieved - apart from the head. Inspector Maigret is determined to unearth the truth behind this disturbing murder. When he meets the strangely taciturn owner of a shabby local bistro, Madame Calas, who says her husband is away, the pieces start to fall into place. But, as the dogged, laconic detective discovers, nothing in this tangled case is as it seems.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, France, Detective, Thriller, Noir

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1955

About the 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.

Reviews

[Jim Fonseca · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun read, if you don’t mind it being about a headless male corpse found in a Paris canal. This is an inspector Maigret police procedural set in Paris in the 1950’s or so. There’s local color of the canal docks in Paris and café life.



It’s a who-done-it but the plot is not what drives the story. Maigret becomes fascinated with a woman, a café owner, who seems to be the primary suspect. She’s a 40-ish woman, not really physically attractive, but Maigret becomes almost fixated on her staid take on life, apparently a dull one, married to an abusive husband. The woman has multiple lovers when her husband is away, even to the point that some local prostitutes complain about her “giving it away for free.” Even Maigret’s wife detects his brooding interest and starts questioning him about her.

Maigret muses that he thinks of himself occasionally as a “mender of destinies” who tries to get people back on the “right track.” He doesn’t use the word psychoanalyst but the author does.

Little by little we watch the plot develop as they the police try to find the identity of the man in the days before fingerprint banks. The story adds interest in the conflict between Maigret and his supervising magistrate, a jerk of course. But the genius of Simenon weaves a tale with a lot of dialog that still manages to surprise us.



I found the ending a little flat. For example, a lot was made of searches of premises trying to find where the body was dismembered. Even though the guilty party (parties?) confess, we never find out – or what happened to the head.



You always get a good story from Simenon, the Belgian author who wrote in French and is best known for his Inspector Maigret series. Incredibly, Simenon wrote more than 500 novels. And it’s amazing to see some of the blurbs about his writing and who they are from (not about his Maigrets, but about his psychological novels he called his 'roman durs'): John Banville wrote of his “extraordinary masterpieces of the twentieth century.” William Faulkner said “I love reading Simenon. He makes me think of Chekhov.” And [maybe a bit much] a reviewer in The Independent wrote “Simenon ought to be spoken of in the same breath as Camus, Beckett and Kafka.”

I enjoy reading a Maigret as a break from more serious topics. I’ve read a dozen or so but I won’t list all of my reviews below, just the few I’ve read that have ratings higher than 3.8 on GR:

Maigret’s Pickpocket

Maigret and the Loner

Maigret and the Madwoman

Maigret Has Scruples

Maigret Sets a Trap

[Adrian · Rating 4 out of 5]

January 2023 1st Lunchtime Listen.

About 3 years or so ago, I started buying (in paperback) the Maigret novels ( second hand or new I didn't mind) in order. I decided to read them at the rate of one a month which was no real hardship, as 1) they are excellent stories and 2) they are all only around 170-190 pages. I think I was somewhere in the 20s (and had amassed paperbacks to maybe number 40) when we moved and all my books got packed away. A couple of weeks ago I (99%) finished the room I call my new library ( about half the size of the old one - we downsized our house as the boys are busy with their own lives in London and Berlin), so most of the books just got shoved on all the new shelves so we could recycle the boxes. I have as yet, not felt like doing a massive sort of the books so they are grouped in the correct way and not King next to Doyle or Christie next to Herbert. Hopefully when that happens I will find all my Maigret's, in the meantime whenever one was cheap on Audible, I have bought regardless of sequence (what a rebel ha ha) and my wife and I have listened to many over a number of lunchtimes during our renovations.
This listen only differed in that we are still on our break until we feel like finishing off the last few bits of work on the house. So we collapsed for a couple of afternoons on the sofas and allowed the wonderful voice and narration of Gareth Armstrong to flow over us.
So the story centres around, funny enough bits of a corpse discovered in a canal after a barge overly laden stirs up the ooze at the bottom. A search by divers discovers various bits of a body except the head. Maigret soon has a suspicion he could be the husband of the non committal surly and perpetually drunk female patron of a local bistro. He then spends the next few days investigating with unfortunately one of his least favourite judges on his back clamouring for results. Concerned that he is not seeing the whole picture he sits in the bistro on his own drinking calvados searching for inspiration, little knowing that his thoughts and events behind the scene will soon collide and bring him the results he needs to satisfy the surly judge.

[Berengaria · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars

A somewhat disappointing Maigret from 1955, as there is no investigation as such. The identity of the man found in a canal hacked into pieces is virtually clear from chapter one and Maigret (or his flunkies) simply needs to scrounge up enough solid evidence to support what he's already heavily surmised.

This makes for a slow, repetitive, pensive story despite Simenon's characteristic telegraphic style and heavy use of dialogue. There are some clever deductions and the characters Maigret interviews are very well drawn, but the novel itself fails to grip or convince as a whole.

Read in the original French as part of my Foreign Language Reading Challenge 2024.

[Razvan Banciu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps not the best action from Maigret series, but surely one of the best characters created by Mr. Simenon: Madame Calas, the weird woman who runs a bistro.

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

Έχω καταλήξει σε δύο συμπεράσματα με τον μεσιέ Σιμενόν. Το πρώτο είναι πως τα βιβλία του είναι, λόγω μεγέθους και συγγραφικής νοοτροπίας, τέτοια που αν έχεις τον χρόνο να τα διαβάσεις με την μία, δεν θα σε αφήσουν να τα αφήσεις. Αν για τον χ,ψ λόγο τα αφήσεις 1-2+ μέρες, ξεθωριάζουν γρήγορα και δυσκολεύεσαι να μπεις στο κλίμα. Γεγονός που συμβαίνει συχνά στα αστυνομικά, μιας και οι λεπτομέρειες της υπόθεσης ξεχνιούνται, αλλά στην ροή του συγκεκριμένου συγγραφέα, είναι πιο έντονο.

Το δεύτερο, είναι πως για αυτό που είναι τα συγκεκριμένα βιβλία με τον Μαιγκρέ, είναι πολύ καλά. Εξηγούμαι: Δεν θα συναντήσει κανείς κανένα αριστούργημα της αστυνομικής λογοτεχνίας στα νουάρ του Σιμενόν. Δεν θα συναντήσει κάποια ιδιαιτερότητα που τον κάνει να ξεχωρίζει, όπως π.χ. την φοβερή ικανότητα δημιουργίας ατμόσφαιρας και χαρακτήρων που έχει ο Ντόιλ, η hard-boiled σκοτεινιά των Τσάντλερ/Ελρόι ή η οξυδέρκεια και η πρωτοτυπία της σύγχρονης αστυνομικής διαδικασίας όπως την απεικονίζει ο Γκρανζέ. Αλλά, για να γεμίσουν ώρες, να κάνουν τον αναγνώστη να ξεχαστεί μέσα στα σοκάκια του Παρισιού που προσπαθεί να σηκωθεί στα πόδια του από έναν πόλεμο, να δώσουν "τόσο-όσο" ιστορίες που σου αφήνουν έντονα στο κλείσιμο την αίσθηση ότι είσαι ψυχαγωγημένος, είναι ο,τι πρέπει. Δεν χρειάζεται και δεν είναι εφικτό όλα να είναι αριστουργήματα, κάποιοι συγγραφείς όπως ο Σιμενόν, ξεχωρίζουν από την συνέπεια τους και μια συνεχή λογοτεχνική ποιότητα χωρίς εξωφρενικές αυξομοιώσεις, είτε προς τα πάνω είτε προς τα κάτω. Ας σημειωθεί εδώ, πως στο "Ακέφαλο πτώμα" έδειξε πολύ καλά στοιχεία ψυχανάλυσης και βασικής γνώσης ανθρώπινης ψυχολογίας.

Τα κοινωνικά μυθιστορήματα βέβαια, είναι άλλη κουβέντα.

[Mack · Rating 5 out of 5]

Again, Simenon writes the human story. I could rave about it, but that would be totally out of place. More likely, I should see if my cat has water.

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my third--and, so far, favorite--Maigret. The other two I read were place outside of Paris; this one is in the heart of Paris, in a seedy, rundown district. Parts of a body are found in the river by a boat running aground; only the head is missing. Apparently, dismembered women are frequently found but this one is a man: much more unusual.

In his quest to discover the identity of the man and the person who killed him, Maigret meets my favorite character (outside of Maigret himself) in the series so far. In fact, she is one of the more interesting characters I've met in general. Madame Calas is a cypher, an alcoholic bistro owner who gives nothing away in Maigret's interrogations, she is a mysterious figure. She fascinates Maigret as well who becomes almost (or actually) more interested in her and her history than in the crime itself.

As I have found so far in the series, the solution of the crime is of less interest than are the characters, the locale, and, most of all, Maigret himself. Simenon is able to capture a sense of place with a few evocative images. He is expert at creating a picture of a place and its people in very few words. That is part of the power of his writing.

Maigret himself is a man driven by the need to discover truth. He is interested in the secrets of the human heart and, as he himself says, a need to bring people to their better selves, not just to root out criminels. He is drawn to understanding people's actions and lives and the relationships amongst them.

The series is addictive and I can't wait to read my next one!

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe a few to many coincidences with of all the bars and bistros in Paris Maigret picks the one with the mysterious Madame Calas. Her husband is missing and Maigret is investigating a headless cut up body found in a canal nearby.

Through several white wines, beer and brandies Maigret solves the case if a bit farfetched with an inheritance refused, an angry husband and a lover who intervenes. I liked how the story all comes together and the ginger cat was a bonus.

SPOILERS AHEAD

In the end Madame Calas an alcoholic refused her million franc inheritance. Her husband loses his rag and tries to force her to sign a paper that she will take it violently. Her lover Pape intervenes and kills her husband and then chops up his body and throws it in the canal. Entertaining.

[John Darnielle · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good mystery for me stands or falls on the success of its tone rather than the details of its plot or the strength of its characters, although the latter quality is certainly important. This is the first Simenon I’ve read. Its final page — light, clean, neatly layered — will stick with me for some time. Maigret is a treat and the pacing is addictive — the pure pleasure of reading a good story. I bought this used from a rack full of Simenon paperbacks at the Strand the other day; I had a feeling I’d regret not grabbing two or three, and now I do.

[Kristen · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first Maigret. A good, snack-size mystery, somewhere at the midpoint of golden age and hard-boiled. The likening of Maigret's work as a detective to the job of the psychoanalyst ("to bring a man face to face with his true self") is at the heart of the story.

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

I quite enjoyed this one, a very interesting and intriguing case. The trademark enjoyable characters that add to the story. I seem to enjoy the Maigrets that take place along the canal and waterways the most.

[Fo · Rating 4 out of 5]

داستان‌های مگره واقعا ژانر خاصی هستند، نه پلیسی صرف هستند و نه کارگاهی. داستان‌هایی هستند اجتماعی یا جامعه شناسی روی یک بستر قتل یا جنایت. این داستان روایت به گونه‌ای بود که خیلی بیشتر روی جنبه مسائل اجتماعی تاکید شده بود

[Steve Payne · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maigret is on a case where bits and pieces of a body are picked from out of a canal.

I think I’m done with Simenon now, or at least Maigret, for a while. I understand we are reading about a worn, tired, middle-aged police detective who is wearied by the mundane repetition and subservient absurdities he often has to deal with, but does the flat and dreary prose have to reflect this? Patrick Hamilton also wrote of dark and dreary lives, but he didn’t use this as an excuse for tired prose. Despite the often dull lives of Hamilton’s characters, he still managed to give them depth, reason, and conflict - giving them a life that feeds our intrigue, and our urge to know of their outcomes. I couldn’t give a toss about the lifeless characters in either of the two Maigret novels I’ve read, and only slightly more in one of the two non-Maigret novels that I’ve finished by Simenon. But of course Hamilton wrote only a dozen novels, whereas Simenon pushed out 400+. And of course, I’m probably comparing apples and oranges.

Simenon literally seems to go out of his way to tell his tales in the style of an uninterested eyewitness bluntly stating events in the fashion of someone barely awake, even frequently resorting to the dull telling of events that have happened off stage, or in the past. The writer is on record as stating that he removes anything remotely poetic from his books. Mmm... I’m not so sure about this. I think the dull flatness is probably more down to the churning out of 400+ novels! I’m all for seeming simplicity and straightforwardness in prose and storytelling, but that doesn’t mean it has to be dull. The usual good start, and inclusion of a few brief moments of Parisian atmosphere to inject some colour just isn’t enough. Raymond Carver was another who liked straight and direct prose, but was far from dull.

Even if I have missed some glorious issue here in Simenon’s tired style of narratively crawling from point A to point B to point C, the ending is unforgivable. It’s not much better than the waking up and it was all a dream cliché. I confess I was wearily wandering by then - aah, but then perhaps that’s the glorious point of it, I’m now able to empathise and share in Maigret’s worldly weariness. But the end? Does Maigret’s actual ‘solving’ of this case really rely on coincidences and a fortuitous bumping in to? Good grief, using the methods displayed here I could solve every single crime. All I have to do is just wander into enough Café Nero’s and Costa’s! It’s as simple as that. Top detective!

Enough. I’m done in.

With reservations, I quite liked the non-Maigret, ‘The Venice Train,’ so I may return to Simenon in the future. But not anytime soon.

[Eternauta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ώριμοι τόσο ο Σιμενόν όσο και ο Μαιγκρέ στο βιβλίο αυτό φλερτάρουν με την ψυχανάλυση. Το focus στρέφεται περισσότερο στην ατμοσφαιρα των μπιστρό στις κακόφημες γειτονιές γύρω από το κανάλι του Saint Martin και λιγότερο στην πλοκή. Απολαυστικό αν και θα απογοητεύσει όσους αναζητούν ένα αινιγματικό σενάριο. Εδώ ο Σιμενόν νιώθει την άνεση να βγάλει την πιο ανθρώπινη, ψυχογραφική πλευρά του Μαιγκρέ, ως επίδοξου "επιδιορθωτή πεπρωμένων".

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a classic in the Maigret series in my opinion, as it reveals the methods of the detective and demonstrates his unwillingness to proceed until he is ready.
""To tell the truth, he didn't yet know what he was going to do with her. It was quite likely that with another examining magistrate he wouldn't have acted as he had done so far and would have taken more risks. With Coméliau that was dangerous. Not only was the magistrate finicky, ....................but he had always viewed Maigret's methods with suspicion, finding them unorthodox. Several times in the past, the two men had clashed openly."
"Did she add anything?
As she left my office, she simply asked me if you'd taken care of her cat.
What did you tell her?
That you had other things to do.
For the rest of his life, Maigret would resent Judge Coméliau for that remark."
This is what makes Maigret so wonderful and why I recommend them without further comment.

[James Lawther · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maigret’s strength isn’t intuitive leaps of investigative genius, nor does he become embroiled in car chases and shoot outs. He simply stands back and watches, trying to make sense of people’s lives and motivations. His talent is an ability to put himself into other’s shoes and understand what induces them to act the way they do.

Simenon’s writing is flat and sparse yet evocative. The solution to the crime is almost secondary to the description of the characters, their emotions and behaviours.

By the time I’d finished the book, I felt sorry for the murderer. Some corpses, headless or not, deserve everything they get.

Read a little more at https://crimebooks.uk/?books=headless...

[Ivonne Rovira · Rating 3 out of 5]

Chief Inspector Maigret spends more time philosophizing than detecting in the 47th novel in Georges Simenon’s usually excellent series. A dismembered corpse turns up in a Parisian canal, and Maigret tries to determine if he’s a missing bistro owner. Some pretty surprising discoveries at the end, but not enough to save this novel. A rare Simenon miss.

[Kostas Kanellopoulos · Rating 2 out of 5]

Παλιά όταν διαβάζα Μαιγκρέ σκεφτόμουν τον Ζαν Γκαμπεν, πλεον τον Ρόουαν Άτκινσον. Δεν είναι όμως αυτός ο λόγος που δεν με τράβηξε το βιβλίο.

[Sketchbook · Rating 2 out of 5]

Deliberately colorless, the flat Simenon "style" initially arrested me in this whodunit police procedural (not a favorite genre), starring an enigmatic woman as prime suspect. She's a chilly pleasure. Yet: I wasnt happy that Mme and Maigret meet accidentally and that, at finale, Simenon uses a complicated, corny "back story," like Dame Agatha, for explanations. This is my pet peeve ag the Great Dame. Y'know, Uncle Willie, eg, supposedly lost in an avalanche, pops up 30 years later to ---aw, never mind. The big cheat: Simenon never explains how the malefactors chop up a dead body and then mop up all the blood leaving no evidence, in record time, but are sloppy about tossing the body parts. His depiction of some thwarted Parisians lacks any surprise. Character, oft unbelievable, is the thing, or tries to be --- not the play.

[Andy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Probably my least favourite Maigret so far. It lacked complexity, and Simenon never really engaged us with the mystery of the main suspect. Still well told of course, but lacking something in plot.

[Jefferson Fortner · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been reading the Simenon novels about Chief Inspector Maigret as simply a bit of light reading in bed before going to sleep. The stories are well-crafted and well-written, so I do not mean to dismiss them. Simenon is excellent. However, I was not particularly analyzing the structure until recently. I was simply reading for the story. The result is that I had read quite a few of the novels (but only a fraction of the 70+ titles available) before I began to notice patterns. This one is a very good entry in the series, but I noticed things a bit more than I have in the past. Like many detective novels (police procedurals?), the novels tend to open with a death that must be investigated. This makes sense because Maigret is Chief Inspector. Why would the Chief Inspector be involved in the story before there has been a murder? I am not going to give away any particular spoilers about this story, but it may be a bit of a spoiler for some of the other novels to say that Simenon tends to prefer corpses that died quickly, and what is more quick than being shot in the head? There are some exceptions to being shot, but the deaths tend to still involve the head, and these are usually advertised in the title, such as the hanged man in The Hanged Man of Saint-Pholien and the headless corpse in this title. Another thing that is distinctive about Simenon is that, so far, there has never been a second murder, unlike an Agatha Christie novel. In a Christie novel, as Hercule Poirot learns more about the intricacies of the puzzle that he faces, a second person is frequently killed. So far, this has never happened in Simenon. This is because of the main difference that I have noticed between Christie and Simenon. Christie presents a puzzle that Poirot must unravel. When he determines how the murder was committed, he will know who did it. Of course, he discusses motives, but the puzzle is the thing. Simenon, however, tends to present fewer potential murderers, and Maigret begins at a very early stage to focus on, and get to know, the actual murderer. The key focus in a Simenon novel is that Maigret focuses on getting to know the people involved. His concern is to discover the motive involved, the psychology involved, and the interpersonal dynamics within the small group involved. How does this affect, on a daily basis, everyone involved? Understanding these people and connecting to the small triggers that lead to resentment and violence are the keys to his investigation, and this is what makes these novels such a pleasure. That, and Maigret’s pleasant wanderings in the neighborhood of the crime, where he stops into bars for a drink at all hours of the day, morning to evening, and at times stops for meals. He sits and mulls things over, usually with one of the men who works with him, and he talks to prostitutes and petty criminals as often as he speaks to lawyers and doctors and such. These books are rich in these details, and one of the best things about the stories. There is a sense of a living city, Paris, as being a part of the tale.

[Geo Moisi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Policier clasic, la obiect.

Da, centrat pe personajul principal. Și nici măcar eroul negativ nu e construit cine știe, ca să nu mai zic de celelalte personaje, cum ar fi soția lui Maigret.

Totuși, Simenon a făcut în cartea asta ce trebuie să facă un roman polițist: o crimă, descoperirea ei, investigația, ancheta.

Singurele înflorituri sunt alea care să te pună în context, să știi unde ești.

Dacă Simenon ar fi scris Cadavrul fără cap în 2025, ar fi publicat ori pe banii lui, ori pe Wattpad, căci, nu-i așa, i-ar fi lipsit profunzimea, personajele solide, emoția, nu s-ar fi atașat cititorii de personaje, etc, etc.

[Lazaros Karavasilis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Όταν διάβασα για πρώτη φορά τον 'Πιερ τον Λετονό', την πρώτη ιστορία με πρωταγωνιστή τον επιθεωρητή Μαιγκρέ, ομολογώ πως δεν είχα ενθουσιαστεί. Δεν έπαυε να είναι μια αστυνομική ιστορία του 1930, που σημαίνει πως τα περισσότερα στοιχεία που διέπνεαν το αστυνομικό μυθιστόρημα τότε, θεωρούνται ξεπερασμένα σήμερα.

Θυμάμαι όμως την εντύπωση που μου είχε αφήσει η ατμόσφαιρα του έργου: βροχερή, ομιχλώδης, γκρι. Είναι αυτά τα στοιχεία που με οδήγησαν να επισκεφτώ ξανά το έργο του Σιμενόν, τα οποία βρήκα με το παραπάνω στην ιστορία του 'Ο Μαιγκρέ και το ακέφαλο πτώμα', που θεωρείται απο τις καλύτερες του. Πράγματι, ο Σιμενόν γνωρίζει πως να δημιουργεί ένα κατάλληλο περιβάλλον στο οποίο κινούνται οι χαρακτήρες του και μέσα στο οποίο αντικρούονται διαφορετικές όψεις της γαλλικής κοινωνίας του 1950.

Ο Σιμενόν όμως δεν θέλει να μας πάρει απο το χέρι και να μας δείξει ποιός έκανε τί. Θέλει να αφήσει τον αναγνώστη να διεξάγει το δικό του ψυχογράφημα πάνω στους θύτες και στα θύματα της ιστορίας, μέσω του επιθεωρητή Μαιγκρέ. Με αυτό το τρόπο επιτυγχάνεται μια καταβύθιση στον μικροαστικό ψυχισμό των πρωταγωνιστών, όπου η απλότητα και η ησυχία θεωρούνται ύψιστοι στόχοι, ακόμη και αν οδηγούν σε φόνο.

Ο λόγος, η αιτία, οι κοινωνικοί παράγοντες είναι αυτοί που έχουν τον πρωταγωνιστικό ρόλο στις υποθέσεις του Μαιγκρέ και όχι ο θύτης. Αυτές οι συνιστάμενες κάνουν το έργο του Σιμενόν να ξεχωρίζει.

[Sandro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bello come tutti i libri di Simenon con protagonista Maigret!
In questo, viene particolarmente fuori l'animo indagatore di Maigret, secondo cui la scoperta del colpevole non può prescindere dal capire i motivi che hanno portato le persone a compiere il crimine.

[Madhulika Liddle · Rating 3 out of 5]

A barge, overloaded and with its bottom scraping the floor of a Paris canal, catches on something—and the boat hook that’s used to bring up the obstruction reveals a gruesome find: a man’s arm, wrapped in a neat package with string. A diver appointed by the police to search further finds the rest of the body, in bits and pieces, but no head. Chief Superintendent Maigret sets out to investigate and chance brings him to a small bistro owned by a husband and wife.

The owner, Omer Calas, is away buying wine in the countryside. His wife is an oddly disturbing woman who intrigues and fascinates Maigret with her blend of untidiness, alcoholism, and completely honest admission of promiscuity. As Maigret gradually finds himself convinced that the headless corpse is indeed that of Calas, he must figure out the motive—and the murderer, for how could a woman have so efficiently chopped up a stocky and solid man as Calas?

I liked several aspects of Maigret and the Headless Corpse. One was the way it evoked Paris: vividly and convincingly, yet without long and tedious descriptions. Another was in its characters, who were brilliantly alive. Madame Calas, for instance; the young man who is one of her lovers; the judge who makes life miserable for Maigret; Maigret himself. Madame Calas, especially, is an amazingly interesting character, nuanced and unusual, a person whom I started off being unimpressed by, but who grew on me as the story progressed.

The story was gripping till a certain point: as Maigret and his men go about trying to find out the identity of their grisly discovery; as they carry out their investigation—it’s a good, solid police procedural. And with a strong mystery element to it: who is the dead man? Who killed him? Why? So many questions.

Unfortunately, for me the book faltered in the last chapter or so, because the detection fell flat on its face. The answers to the questions pretty much fall into Maigret’s lap through a sort of coincidence. True, he gets to a certain point by using his own brains, but beyond that, the actual solution to the problem is served up on a platter. An anti-climax, that.

[John Defrog: global citizen, local gadfly · Rating 4 out of 5]

In which Inspector Maigret investigates the discovery of a man’s dismembered corpse in a canal. All pieces are recovered except the head, which makes identification tough. And the only lead (and a weak one at that) seems to be Madame Calas, an alcoholic who runs a nearby bistro whose husband is away on business. As is true of most of the Maigret novels I’ve read so far – but particularly the later ones in the series – the emphasis isn’t on the crime so much as various characters Maigret encounters, their psychological makeup and the situations they find themselves in. For Maigret, the real mystery isn’t whodunit but why – or rather, what makes the suspects tick, particularly Madame Calas, whose mannerisms don’t fit in the context of the case at all if she were the culprit, and yet Maigret can’t help thinking she’s involved somehow. As always, Simenon provides an entertaining read if you like yr detective stories laconic and ponderous as well as/rather than hard-boiled action-packed melodrama.

[Antonella Imperiali · Rating 4 out of 5]

Il fatto che abbia visto (e molto apprezzato) questo episodio in tv almeno un paio di volte, non ha sminuito il piacere di leggere il libro.
Anzi, sicuramente è stato un motivo in più per apprezzare sia il romanzo che la realizzazione televisiva e per poter confrontare le differenze: il racconto di snoda pian piano ed arriva alla fine lasciando intuire come si sono svolti i fatti, lo sceneggiato ne mette in chiaro le dinamiche e gli avvenimenti, rendendolo se possibile più crudo e verosimile.
Promossi entrambi.



🇫🇷 LdM - Sfida 2024: Francia
✍️ GS/Maigret
📺 Visto in TV

[David Mann · Rating 5 out of 5]

My second Maigret (read en français), and my impression is that the plots are somewhat secondary. It is the atmosphere and the ability of Maigret to see both the victims and the perpetrators as victims of circumstance.

That and the fact that solving crimes is never so urgent that one can't take a few moments to stop at a bar for prendre un verre.

[Rhys · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another powerful and compelling 'Maigret' novel in which the solution turns out to have elements of tragedy as well as justice and in which certain characters who seem devoid of dignity actually reveal themselves to be stronger on the inside than one might have imagined.

[Angel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Από τις καλύτερες υποθέσεις με επιθεωρητή Μαιγκρέ!