A. E. W. Mason's fictional detective
Inspector Gabriel Hanaud is a fictional French detective depicted in a series of five novels, one novella and one short story by the British writer A. E. W. Mason. He has been described as the "first major fiction police detective of the Twentieth Century".
Background.
Hanaud was modelled on two real-life heads of the Paris Sûreté, Gustave Macé and Marie-François Goron, whose respective memoirs Mason had studied. Émile Gaboriau's Monsieur Lecoq was also an inspiration.
Mason wanted Hanaud to be a professional detective who was as physically unlike Sherlock Holmes as possible so, in contrast to the slender Holmes, Hanaud became stout and broad-shouldered. He was to be a genial and friendly soul ready, "as the French detective does", to trust his flair or intuition and to take the risk of acting upon it. In the stories, Hanaud often relies on psychological methods to solve cases. He is generally assisted by his friend, the fastidious Julius Ricardo, a former City of London financier.
Hanaud made his first appearance in the 1910 novel "At the Villa Rose" set in the south of France. He appeared in a further four novels and a novella. His last appearance was in the 1946 novel "The House in Lordship Lane". Hanaud has been portrayed on screen several times – with adaptations of "At the Villa Rose" and "The House of the Arrow".
He has been seen as one of a number of influences on the creation of Agatha Christie's Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.
Adaptations.
Film
Television
BBC Radio
References.
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