Many More Miles

Another in our series of articles by the British humorist/columnist Miles Kingston.  This is a fun piece about the great mystery novelists and trying to find the perfect one.  Or combination thereof.

What I particularly like about this one is that he starts the piece writing about the French crime novelist Georges Simenon, whose detective was 'Inspector Maigret."  (Side note:  when the BBC made a series based on the Maigret stories, the character was played by the wonderful actor, Michael Gambon, who became well-known to a later generation of fans as 'Dumbledore,' replacing the late Richard Harris.)  In the article, Kington describes reading Simenon in the original French, as a way to freshen up on the language before he would be traveling to France.  As it happens, that is largely what my father did, as well.

My dad took up French late in life, when he was in his late-40s, because he and my mother were taking vacations to France every year.  After the classes ended, he never continued a great deal of outside reading in French, nor I suspect do most people.  He'd read one -- maybe two books in French, which is still pretty good, but eventually gave it up.  However he always loved reading Simenon that way, for years.

You can read the article here.