I’m making lists of unfamiliar words as I read George Simenon’s 1931 Pietr-le-Letton, the novel debut of the famous commissaire Maigret. Here’s my list for Chapter 13 (Les Deux Pietr) with links to definitions from Linguee and word frequencies from Google Books NGram Viewer.
This chapter is full of dramatic action. First the cliffhanger of the last chapter resolves as Maigret witnesses the Jekyll-Hyde like transformation of the refined, strong Pietr-le-Letton into the crude, weak Fédor Yourovitch. They talk a bit and are briefly interrupted by Le Letton’s wealthy criminal sponsor Mortimer. After he leaves, Maigret realizes that Letton qua Fédor’s mistress Anna is plotting to kill Mortimer from jealousy (recall the revolver in last chapter’s title – Anna wants Fédor to spend more time with her, less time criming). Maigret goes after him, but is too late to prevent the murder. He arrests Anna, but Pietr/Fédor escapes in the confusion.
The chapter spans 6 pages and contained 20 unfamiliar words. The words are mostly about emotional turmoil expressed in the face and body, physical struggle, and garments.
| expression (root) | Frequency in 2010 | Frequency in 1970 | Frequency in 1930 |
|---|---|---|---|
| surcroît | 1 in 66,300 | 1 in 125,000 | 1 in 159,000 |
| pan | 1 in 91,600 | 1 in 133,000 | 1 in 123,000 |
| refouler | 1 in 109,000 | 1 in 145,000 | 1 in 113,000 |
| pourpre | 1 in 236,000 | 1 in 191,000 | 1 in 129,000 |
| houle | 1 in 472,000 | 1 in 340,000 | 1 in 373,000 |
| galon | 1 in 581,000 | 1 in 543,000 | 1 in 445,000 |
| saupoudré | 1 in 723,000 | 1 in 1,320,000 | 1 in 818,000 |
| blafard | 1 in 777,000 | 1 in 967,000 | 1 in 856,000 |
| exsangue | 1 in 794,000 | 1 in 1,330,000 | 1 in 1,600,000 |
| affaissé | 1 in 1,210,000 | 1 in 1,040,000 | 1 in 676,000 |
| trépigner | 1 in 1,220,000 | 1 in 1,750,000 | 1 in 1,620,000 |
| pitre | 1 in 2,000,000 | 1 in 1,630,000 | 1 in 1,140,000 |
| érailler | 1 in 2,050,000 | 1 in 4,090,000 | 1 in 3,200,000 |
| pelisse | 1 in 2,170,000 | 1 in 1,680,000 | 1 in 1,070,000 |
| écoeurant | 1 in 4,620,000 | 1 in 12,500,000 | 1 in 23,300,000 |
| bonasse | 1 in 7,060,000 | 1 in 4,710,000 | 1 in 4,530,000 |
| dépoitraillée | 1 in 20,600,000 | 1 in 22,000,000 | 1 in 18,900,000 |
Word notes
- dépoitraillée means “bare-chested” from poitrine. Not only is it the word in this chapter with the lowest modern frequency (and nearly the lowest contemporaneous frequency in the whole book), the word doesn’t show up in Google Books corpus before 1855. Probably a neologism at that point. “A bodice ripper” is a dismissive English description of a sexully explicit romance novel. Maigret isn’t steamy stuff, but Anna’s bodice is indeed ripped as she struggles during her arrest.
- bonasse is excessively kind. Some translations make it “goody two-shoes”, “meek”, or “naïve”. Simenon uses it to describe Cain in the biblical story of the two brothers.
- écoeurant is “nauseating” or “revolting”. We saw its infinitive écoeurer back in Chapter 8, so I would normally omit this entry. But a reader pointed out to me that in modern Québecois, this word is generally used to have a positive meaning. This happens in English too: “That fastball was nasty. That was a filthy pitch” or “This cake is wicked.” They shared this helpful video lesson on the Québecois écoeurant with me as well.
- érailler is “to rub”, “to fray”, “to wear”, “to scuff”, etc. It’s another one of these words that is far more frequent in its past-participle used as an adjective (like crispé and saccadé from last chapter). While normally it means “worn” or “frayed”, it translates better as “hoarse” when describing a voice, which is how Simenon uses it here (une voix trop éraillé). One dictionary translates voix éraillé as “whiskey voice”, which is not an English expression familiar to me.
- trépigner literally means “to stamp one’s foot with emotion”, but is mostly used metaphorically. A common expression is «trépignent d’impatience», “bursting with impatience”: Vous trépignez d’impatience d’évoluer? It maps to the English animal-based metaphors “chomping at the bit” and “raring to go”. But also somewhat “milling around”: Simenon wrote «les femmes criaient par surcroît, pleuraient ou trépignaient» in describing a scene of hotel guests in the corridor after a the police arrive to investigate a murderous gunshot.
- blafard and exsangue are near synonyms, both meaning “pale” or “sallow”. Exsangue literally means “without blood” or “with the blood removed”. Curiously, livide also means “pale”, with the connotation of being the result of sickness or strong emotion. In English “livid” is more often heard as a description of extreme anger or rage (“He was livid when he learned his son had gambled away the money.”). But in English the color associated with this word is a dark, gray, bluish, purple (“a livid bruise”). From what I can tell, livide is primarily associated with white in French, but does have a secondary meaning of blue-ish.
- houle is an ocean swell or a wave. Simenon uses it in the poetic phrase «visage … blafard avec … des yeux couleur de houle». I like that houle is not really a color – it’s the ocean that is colored blue or green or gray – but by using that word the suggestion is that the person is experiencing a forceful swell of emotion, which is covered by the pallor of the rest of the face. Also, the word reminds by of hublot (porthole), though I don’t think the etymologies are connected.
Common words, uncommon meanings
- pan is a very flexible word. Un pan can mean “a section”, “a panel”, “a flap”, “a facet”, “a part”, “a face (of a mountain)”, “a branch (of a subject)”, “a segment (of a population)”, or “a framing member (in construction)”. Most of these meanings are actually common, but there are so many of them I thought it noteworthy. In this chapter Simenon uses it to describe «un pan de la pelisse», “a flap of the cloak”.
- pourpre is simply “purple”, and is mostly on this list because Simenon used it as a contrast with exsangue and blafard. I was confused, so I added it to research later. But it’s true that out of context, I was not 100% confident that this was just “purple” and not some idiomatic expression..