NoirCon Hangover: Georges Simenon

One of the highlights of NoirCon (this past weekend; no, I didn't blog about it this weekend; yes, I suck) was listening to Scott Phillips and Bill Boyle talk about Georges Simenon. For years I'd written ol' Georges off as the author of a detective series that looked a bit too stuffy for my tastes. Then Al Guthrie turned me on to his short "hard" (or "pure") novels, and the scales fell from eyes. Simenon's stuff can be as bleak as it gets, and that's what Scott and Bill discussed, as well as Simenon's amazing writing process and his love of simple language. I could have listened to those guys for hours, even though I was still suffering from a mind-crippling hangover at 2 p.m.

Coincidentally, Bruce Grossman over at Bookgasm mentioned a paperback called For Bond Lovers Only, a collection of James Bond/Ian Fleming essays, and it includes a piece about Fleming and Simenon. I read the "The Thriller Business" last night, and right in the middle is the best defense of the "short novel" I've ever heard. (This is Simenon talking.) Right on Georges! Anyway, For Bond Lovers Only is worth tracking down this piece alone.

"I have a theory about the novel. We do not write novels as they did in Dickens' time. For many reasons. First there is photography. We do not have to describe any more. Everybody has seen the Eiffel Tower. There are many problems we do not have to explain any more. What Balzac had to explain we do not have to. Now in every newspaper there are articles telling you almost everything. We do not have to write long novels any more. A novel ought to be read in one sitting. You would not go one day to see the first act of Hamlet and one week later the second. It is the same with the novel. This is why I choose to write short novels."

Right on Georges! Anyway, For Bond Lovers Only is worth tracking down this piece alone. The cheesecake shots of the Bond girls aren't bad, either.