The Man Who Watched Trains Go By by Georges Simenon

(pb; 1938)

Review

“Kees Popinga is a solid Dutch burgher whose idea of a night on the town is a game of chess at his club. Or so it has always appeared. But one night this model husband and devoted father discovers his boss is bankrupt and that his own carefully tended life is in ruins. Before he had looked on impassively as the trains to the outside world swept by; now he catches the first train he can to Amsterdam. Not long after that, he commits murder.

“Kees Popinga is tired of being Kees Popinga. He’s going to turn over a new leaf─though there will be hell to pay.”

Review

Man is a chatty, darkly comedic and occasionally excellent crime thriller that predates and brings to mind the tone and style of Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 novel The Talented Mr. Ripley, in that Simenon’s Popinga is an inexperienced rollercoaster-emotions killer. Unlike Ripley, though, Popinga is mostly thrill and don’t-care-about-the-future─this makes sense, since Popinga is middle-aged and initially tired, unable to match Ripley’s twenty-something tumultuousness.

Popinga’s interior nattering─which takes up a significant part of Man─reveals him to be a petty, minor figure (which is Simenon’s intention). That said, this nattering runs overlong sometimes, overlapping into authorial self-indulgence. This indulgence almost compelled me to set down Man on page three (I had not read a Simenon book before) but I’m glad I stuck with it, if mostly to finish this relatively short work. This is a good read, if you have a high tolerance for tiring, character-defining pettiness. If not (but still curious), borrow Man from the library or buy it for cheap (as in: two dollars). 

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The resulting film, The Paris Express, was released stateside on June 5, 1953. Harold French directed and co-scripted it. His originally uncredited partner in writing was Paul Jarrico.

Claude Rains played Kees Popinga. Märta Torén played Michele Rozier. Herbert Lom played Julius de Koster, Jr. Anouk Aimée, billed as Anouk, played “Jeanne, the Prostitute.”

Felix Aylmer played Mr. Merkemans. Ferdy Mayne played Louis. Lucie Mannheim played Maria Popinga. Gibb McLaughlin played Julius de Koster, Sr. Robin Alalouf played Karl Popinga. Joan St. Clair played Frida Popinga.