Sunday

There is no author more suited to summer reading than Georges Simenon. And not because his work is light or unimportant. Simenon is a towering writer, but I find that reading him amidst the chattering song of cicadas – perhaps whilst lying in a hammock, in your swimming trunks, or in a woodland during a break on a long walk – is simply ideal. Because Sim accompanies you everywhere with the subterranean hum of life – inner life, often wicked, shameful, vindictive – yet with the gentle breath of normality, and without conveying any sense of foreboding. Paradoxically, however, he conveys serenity, perhaps resignation. It tells you: see, this is human nature; this is how things are. He has written an endless number of books, and everyone is free to prefer one title or another.

I’d say anything goes – Maigret or not Maigret, absolutely anything. Adelphi has been publishing and reissuing the entire series for years, and there’s always another novel to offer readers for the first time in Italian. The most recent, translated by Daniela Salomoni, is entitled "Domenica. Qualcosa deve accadere di domenica". There’s a man who detests his wife – who, it must be said, is far his superior, even if she isn’t particularly likeable – but I challenge you to find any ‘likeable’ characters in Simenon, apart from Maigret. So, he has to get rid of this wife. Yes, he wants to kill her, to get her out of the way. Is it because he’s fallen in love with Ada, the young new employee at the little hotel they run together – he in the kitchen, his wife perpetually doing the accounts? No, not for that reason. Ada suits him because she’s wild and submissive. Love is something else entirely, and he’s not in a position to know what it is. Sim doesn’t portray grand emotions on stage; if anything, he depicts the wretchedness of the emotions and inner drives of men and women who allow themselves to be overwhelmed by their own insignificance. Indeed, what other author has been better able to portray such mediocrity through the characters’ thoughts and even their most subtle gestures? We don’t even care whether that wife will be killed or not. The fact is that, amidst the deafening cicadas and the endless heat of this summer, there is nothing more comforting than sitting still and reading Simenon.

Georges Simenon

Adelphi, 159 pp., 18 euros