Georges Simenon created detective Maigret

Georges Simenon

It is the birthday of Belgian writer Georges Simenon (1903), whose fictional French detective, Commissaire Maigret, is featured in 75 novels and 28 short stories published from 1931 until 1972. The detective was known for his pipe and his consumption of alcohol. Simenon went to Paris in the 1920s. Though married, he carried on numerous affairs, including, famously, with Josephine Baker. He lived in a farm house in eastern France during World War II and was accused of collaborating with the German during the occupation. To escape questioning, he fled to Quebec after the war. He came to the United States and traveled the country. He lived for a time in the 1950s in Anna Maria Island, Florida, and later in Nogales, Arizona. Simenon wrote more than 350 novels and novellas as well as articles, pulp novels under numerous pseudonyms and autobiographical works. He was among the most prolific writers of the 20th century, writing 60 to 80 pages a day.