Illustrated History of the French Saint novels

The Fayard Saint series debuted with The Saint in New York (No. 1) which, as every devotee knows, opens with a memo sent by Teal to Fernack recapping some of Simon Templar's more notorious adventures, including Meet the Tiger!, The Last Hero and Knight Templar. Why therefore begin a series with material which was bound to confuse a new reader?

Further confusion must have ensued when one realizes that the second volume released by Fayard was Knight Templar (translated under the title of The Heroic Adventure), a direct sequel to The Last Hero.

The reason for this strange release pattern is that there were previous French Saint editions of The Last Hero and Meet the Tiger!, published in 1935 by Editions Gallimard in their "Detective" imprint. Fayard, therefore, did not have the rights to publish these books -- yet -- but legitimately assumed that the reader of the times could refer to them if they wished to do so.

The copyright on The Saint in New York is 1938. Normally, the French copyright is supposed to indicate the date of the first French publication of a work (i.e.: referring to a specific translation). However, mistakes creep up frequently. Sometimes, the later date of printing of a subsequent edition is substituted. For example, the copyright on a subsequent edition of Knight Templar is 1946, even though the first Fayard edition of that book was released in 1938. The copyright on Thieves' Picnic (No. 10) is mistakenly listed as 1930, even though that particular book was written by Leslie Charteris in 1937! This is just to illustrate the fact that French copyright mentions are notoriously unreliable, thus making serious research all but impossible.

Dedicated researchers might further note that the copyright on Thieves' Picnic is in the name of "A. Fayard et Cie (& Co.)", while all the other books in the series were copyrighted in the names of "F. Brouty, J. Fayard et Cie" until 1956 (No. 47), when suddenly the copyright became "Librairie Arthème Fayard", until the end of the series. One can only assume that F. Brouty bought stock in the original Arthème Fayard publishing company sometime around 1939, at which time the original Arthème Fayard was succeeded by J. Fayard. The later change to Librairie Arthème Fayard must have been the result of some form of corporate restructuring.

Meet the Tiger! and The Last Hero were eventually re-released, first by Gallimard again in 1951, then by Fayard in 1962, respectively as No. 70 and No. 72 in the series. However, the copyright on these two books -- even in the Fayard edition -- remains Gallimard's, even though the books were translated by the same writer. From this, it is clear that, even though Meet the Tiger! and The Last Hero were first published in France in the 1930s, for some contractual reasons, the rights to these novels did not become available to Fayard until the early 1960s.

The matter of the identity of the translator of the French Saint books remained for a long time relatively clouded in mystery. Nos. 1 to 6, 9 to 14, 23 and 70 (Meet the Tiger!) were credited to "E. Michel-Tyl", with No. 19 being specifically credited to "Ed. Michel-Tyl" -- "Ed." being for Edmond.

Edmond Michel-Tyl (1891-1949) was the author of a number of adventure and romance novels, including Marquita au Col d'Or [Marquita of the Golden Neck] (Tallandier, 1936) and La Vallée du Mystère [The Valley of Mystery] (Librairie des Champs-Élysées, 1940); he also translated many other crime novels, such as William Irish's The Bride Wore Black, Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe, Rafael Sabatini's Sea Hawk and Captain Blood, Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon, and novels by R. K. Goldman, Hugh Austin, Sidney Fairway, Erskine Caldwell, etc.

No. 8 (in a later edition) and Nos. 27 to 29 are credited "M.-E. Michel-Tyl" -- note the periods and the hyphen. All this confusion in the credits merely reflects the fact that, after Edmond Michel-Tyl's death in 1949, his wife, Madeleine (who had previously been collaborating with her husband), took over his duties.

Nos. 7 and 15 (in later editions), Nos. 22, 24 to 26, 30 to 69, 71, 72 (The Last Hero, which is odd since, in in all logic, this book should have been translated by Edmond and not by Madeleine), Nos. 73 to 78 are all credited to "M. Michel-Tyl" -- the credit normally given to Madeleine Michel-Tyl.

Clearly, mistakes were made in the attribution of credits in the reprinting of later editions, and it is likely that Nos. 7, 8 and 15 -- at least -- are indeed the work of Edmond and not of Madeleine, who took over the series somewhere in the mid-No.20s -- probably with No. 24, the first of that sequence to be credited to "M. Michel-Tyl" instead of "E. Michel-Tyl".

Finally, a letter from Jenny Bradley, Leslie Charteris' French agent, dated 27th February 1969, indicates that Madeleine Michel-Tyl was somewhat extensively assisted by Fayard editor Francis Didelot, himself a well-known writer/editor of French mystery novels. Mrs. Charteris remarked that Leslie Charteris himself stepped in when the quality of the French novels had started to come down, and ended up working in "quite a close partnership" with Madeleine Michel-Tyl. He offered the New York Herald-Tribune comic strips as source material -- which contained much specific dialogue as well as descriptions -- thereby facilitating the novelisation process.

In any event, the Michel-Tyls are, without a doubt, the greatest of all of Leslie Charteris' "collaborators" and, to the extent that they "rewrote" the original comic-strip stories, virtually co-authors. Edmond Michel-Tyl, a talented writer in his own right, succeeded wonderfully in duplicating Charteris' light style and wry characterization in French, perhaps inspired by, or following in the literary tracks of, Maurice Leblanc, creator of the incredibly popular character of Arsène Lupin, gentleman-burglar, which must have been one of Charteris' major source of inspiration when creating the Saint.

Born in Zaragosa (Spain) in 1902, Regino Bernad moved to France in 1924 and eventually became a French citizen in 1957. He first worked as an advertising artist, then in 1931 began contributing cartoons and illustrations to daily papers such as Le Rire, Frou-Frou, etc.

In 1951, Bernad drew the daily comic strip Balaoo for the daily newspaper France-Soir. Balaoo was an adaptation of a novel by famous writer Gaston Leroux (Phantom of the Opera) about a murderous ape-man.

For 15 years, also for France-Soir, Bernad drew the Cheri-Bibi daily strip (see left), also based on a series of novels by Leroux, featuring the adventures of the eponymous convict. The Cheri-Bibi strip was written by Leroux's own son, G.-A. Leroux. It was very successful and, in its totality, comprised 4462 strips.

Bernad passed away in 1972.

After Knight Templar (No. 2) and She was a Lady (No. 3), the Fayard series continued with Saint Overboard (No. 4), Alias the Saint (No. 5), Getaway (No. 6) and The Saint versus Scotland Yard (No. 7), the latter bizarrely copyrighted in 1956 in a later edition printed in 1964, even though the first Fayard edition was released in 1939, illustrating again the vagaries of French copyrights.

The next two volumes complicate the researcher's life. The first, released under the translated title of The Saint Here! (No. 8), in addition to being also wrongly copyrighted to 1951 (even though it was originally released in 1940), contained only two stories, The Gold Standard and The Death Penalty, taken from the original three-story collection The Saint and Mr.Teal (a.k.a. Once More the Saint). The third story, The Man from St.Louis, for reasons unknown, was published in The Companions of the Saint (No. 9), an equally incomplete translation of the original three-story collection Enter the Saint.

Having to make room for The Man from St.Louis in The Companions of the Saint, Fayard then chose to defer the publication of the first story of that book, The Man Who Was Clever, to No. 18 of its own series. To further complicate matters, The Man from St. Louis, The Death Penalty and The Gold Standard were all released separately in 1950, under different titles, by another French publisher, Editions Ferenczi, in their "Le Verrou" (The Deadbolt) imprint.

As we have seen, No. 10 was a straightforward adaptation of Thieves' Picnic (it only stands out because of its puzzling 1930 copyright), No. 11 of The Misfortunes of Mr.Teal and No. 12 of Follow the Saint. These three books were published in 1941.

After an interruption due to the war, difficulties begin again with No.13, which was released in 1945. Again for reasons unknown, Fayard chose to rearrange the order of the short stories published. No.13, whose French title translates as The Saint Goes to War, reprinted The Wonderful War from Featuring the Saint, and The High Fence and The Case of the Frightened Innkeeper from The Saint Goes On. The third story of that volume, The Elusive Ellshaw, was later used in No. 22. As for the other two stories from Featuring the Saint (The Logical Adventure and The Man Who Could Not Die), they were used in conjunction with The Man Who Was Clever (see above) to make up No.18, entitled The Mark of the Saint.

The series continued with adaptations of The Saint on Guard (No.14) and The Saint Plays with Fire a.k.a. Prelude for War (No. 15). This title may lead to some confusion as a latter volume (No. 37) bears a French title which also translates as The Saint Plays with Fire, while No.15's French title translates as The Saint Plays... And Wins.

The Ace of Knaves (No. 16) and The Saint in Miami (No. 17) followed. No. 18 was, in effect, an original collection by gathering the three stories listed above, under the title of The Mark of the Saint.

This was followed by an adaptation of The Saint Steps In (No. 19) and The Saint Goes West (No. 20). Perhaps for reasons of space, the latter only reprinted the Arizona and Hollywood stories. Fayard eventually combined the third story, Palm Springs, with The Ellusive Ellshaw to make yet one more "original" collection, under the title of The Saint Leads the Dance (No. 22). In 1960, a French motion picture adapting the Palm Springs short story was released under the same title.

The series went on, with adaptations of The Saint Sees It Through (No. 21) and Call for the Saint (No. 23), released in 1948. Fayard then discovered that they were running out of original Saint stories, just as the popularity of their books in France was growing by leaps and bounds.

First, they decided to put out two more collections of short stories collections. No. 25 was a straightforward translation of Saint Errant.

No. 24, on the other hand, was an original collection, entitled The Saint Has Fun. In this book, Fayard picked and chose stories from The Brightest Buccaneer (two stories), The Saint Intervenes (five stories) and The Happy Highwayman (seven stories). This was the first book sequentially credited to Madeleine Michel-Tyl, barring exceptions made for possibly erroneous credits in earlier volumes.

The stories which were not included in The Saint Has Fun were later used in two more original collections, released as No. 69 (The Trumps of the Saint) and No. 76 (Again the Saint!). Why were these stories not used earlier? I do not know.

The Noble Sportsman (from The Saint Intervenes) was translated and published in Le Saint Detective Magazine No. 24, but not included in the books. The Uncritical Publisher (also from The Saint Intervenes) was not translated at all! The likely reason for these rather bizarre omissions is either page count, or the editors simply forgot about them! All in all, a rather confusing situation.

(Note: There is a 1945 French-Canadian of The Saint Intervenes, Le Saint intervient, published by Editions Modernes Ltée, translated by Madeleine Didayer, and it is likely that the "missing" stories were included there.)

In any event, with less original material to translate, and a growing demand for more stories, the time had come for Fayard to develop its own homegrown substitute.

The first French Saint pastiche, No. 26 in the series, was published in 1950 under the title When the Saint Meddles. It was really an anthology of three stories. In From Soja to Textile (source material unknown), Simon exposes Lyman, a killer who uses an ultrasound musical instrument to commit murder. In On the Edge of the Grave (based on the radio script The Man Who Sang by Maurice Zimm), he helps Fernack arrest a gangster, Dixon, who had secretly killed his associate, Blakely, who had stolen a fortune in US Bonds. Finally, in The Doll's Head, which was based on the radio script Doll With a Broken Head by Les Crutchfield, Simon finds a Chinese emerald hidden inside a doll.

(I am very much indebted to Burl Barer's superb book The Saint: A Complete History (McFarland, 1993) for the research concerning the radio scripts.)

The radio "fix-ups" were undoubtedly responsible for the bad reputation that the French Saint pastiches may have acquired. It was stated in Barer's book (page 99) that the first few were reviewed, then rejected by Dutch publisher A. W. Bruna & Zoon. (This, as it turns out, was entirely inaccurate.) Furthermore, it is reported that Mr. Margulies, a friend of Charteris, and Mr. Attenborough of Hodder & Stoughton felt that the French Saint pastiches were badly done and would, if retranslated into English, do great harm to Charteris' reputation.

Despite this, it is worth noting that the Dutch Saint series continued very successfully for many years relying on translastions of the French Saint. (See article by Rinus Daane of the Dutch Saint.)

Upon closer examination, this accusation appears to be somewhat well-founded, but the blame lies not with the French publisher and/or Madeleine Michel-Tyl, but with the material handed to her, presumably by Charteris himself or his publishers. I am referring, of course, to the radio scripts themselves.

Instead of his suave and debonair self, a British version of Arsène Lupin, Simon suddenly turns into an American tough guy, straight out of a Peter Cheyney novel. And, needless to say, all the stories now take place in America. The transition is awkward at best, and reflects more on Michel-Tyl's desire, at first, to be faithful to the tone of the material she was given, rather than her own presumed incompetence.

Michel-Tyl's adaptation from the radio scripts are, stylistically and plot-wise, competent. But they just do not feel like Saint novels -- at least from a purist's eye -- and one can understand the Dutch publisher's rejection.

On the other hand, one strongly questions Mrrs. Attenborough's and Margulies' judgment. Certainly, their harsh comment regarding the quality of Michel-Tyl's work was not only unwarranted, but ignorant. One wonders if their knowledge of French was adequate enough to enable them to properly assess the situation. In any event, no matter how flawed their reasoning may have been, their decision was ultimately right, since Michel-Tyl's radio "fix-ups" would probably have not survived one more translation, back into English.

Certainly, it would appear that both Fayard and Michel-Tyl quickly reached the same conclusion than the Dutch publisher. No. 27 in the series, entitled The Law of the Saint, was another three-story anthology written in the "tough guy" mode, in the same style that must have put off the Dutch publisher, if he ever saw it. The book included The Wine Bottle Rack, based on radio script Family Gun Play by Michael Cramoy; The Bells, based on the radio script Rare Painting Smugglers by Michael Cramoy; and The Filipino Carpet, based on radio script Murder for a Buried Treasure, also by Michael Cramoy. Wisely, Michel-Tyl tried, whenever she could, to combine radio scripts by the same writer.

Starting with No. 28, Michel-Tyl slowly reverted to using a style that became increasingly "laid back", closer to that of the original Saint. She was also no longer satisfied with simply adapting three scripts into three short stories, but started creatively weaving three unconnected scripts into one single novel, often changing the names of the characters, etc. (This elaborate reconstruction work makes the discovery of the source material very difficult.)

No. 28, entitled The Saint Brings Back an Heir, was one single novel, clearly made up of three interconnected stories. The first, The Saint's Mission (possibly but, in that case, very loosely based on Murder on the High Seas by Michael Cramoy), sets the stage: Hamilton, Simon's OSS contact, asks the Saint to bring back the heir to an enormous forture, one Bodhan Kupchinsky, from India. Bodhan turns out to be an old scientist. On board the return ship, Simon foils a plot by the villainous Nadia to kill Bodhan and take his place. The story continues with The Lions' Train, based on Michael Cramoy's Baseball Team Shooting, and finally culminates with King Olsen, based on Sidney Marshall's The Steel Ice Murders.

With No. 29, entitled The Saint Refuses to Sing, Michel-Tyl became increasingly clever in her "fix-up" technique, smoothly blending plot threads from Michael Cramoy's Blackmail and Ken Crossin's Baby Adoption Blackmail Ring into an excellent thriller about a nationwide ring of blackmailers. No. 30, The Saint and the Lame Duck, similarly combined Michael Cramoy's The Disappearing Dentist, Howard Dimsdale's Tiger by the Tail and Margolis & Morheim's Night Club Story.

No. 31, The Saint and the Black Widow, was probably Michel-Tyl's best "fix-up" of the period. It combined three of Cramoy's best efforts: Hard Money, The Latest Style in Murder and Pearls Before Swine into a tautly-paced, relentless thriller, at the end of which Simon discovers that his lady companion, Marie Virva, who called on him to solve the murder of her ex-husband, in in reality the mysterious Black Widow, the leader of the merciless gang of racketeers -- a substial dramatic improvement on the original scripts.

The next volume, The Angels Call For the Saint (No. 32), takes place in Los Angeles and combined three of Howard Dimsdale's scripts: Playing with Fire, The Fence and Crime Wave. Then, The Saint Bets on Death (No. 33) combined Dimsdale's The Saint is Framed with two Joel Murcott scripts: The Death of a Fighter and Jailbreak.

Even though Michel-Tyl had managed, to a large extent, to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse, the days of the "tough guy" Saint were numbered. Three years later, in 1954, Fayard either decided to discontinue the use of the radio scripts, or someone else, very likely Leslie Charteris himself, instructed that they no longer be used. Mrs. Charteris' comment that her husband intervened when he felt that the quality of the novelizations had become unacceptable, and offering instead the comic scripts that he had himself written as source material, would appear to validate the second hypothesis.

In any event, Fayard switched to the New York Herald- Tribune comic-strips for inspiration for its Saint novels. Because these were written by Charteris, with full dialogue and descriptions, they provided Madeleine Michel-Tyl and her editors with much better quality source material.

In total, and as far as I can determine, only twenty-four radio scripts were used, and all came from the first fifty-one episode series. No later scripts seem to have been used. (This information is difficult to ascertain as it requires careful plot comparisons.)

The first story adapted from the NYH-T comic-strip was No. 34, The Saint Refuses a Crown, in which Simon helps Elaine Valdor, heir to the crown of Roldavia, regain her throne and defeat Prince Hugo and villainous financier Lord Bullfish. At the end, Simon turns down her offer to become her consort. Barer quotes Charteris (page 401) as saying that, in the original story which he wrote, the fictional Ruritania-like country was called Valdor, and he was displeased by the decision of the French editors to rename it Roldavia.

Unlike what is stated in Barer's book (page 402), the next French Saint pastiche, No. 35, The Saint Battles a Phantom, was not, at last entirely, based on a NYH-T comic-strip. A careful review of the plot shows that it incorporated elements from two radio scripts, Ken Crossen's With No Tomorrow and Louis Vittes' The Case of the Unkindest Cut, with some additional material which, if not new, may or may not have come from the NYH-T. In this story, drug kingpin Warner Wilson uses Simon to eliminate his four partners: Lane, Becker, Harlan and Henley, so that all the profits from their traffic will remain his alone.

This plot is remarkably similar to that of The Saint in New York -- a fact pointedly acknowledged by Michel-Tyl who, at the end of the book, inserted a line of dialog in which Simon tells the villain that "once in New York, someone tried to play the same trick on him; he was called the Big Man and he died on the electric chair." The rest of the plot revolves around the Crestview medical facility and Lane's use of Chinese coffins to smuggle drugs.

The titles of No. 35 translates as The Saint Battles a Phantom and that of No.36 as The Saint Discovers Virus 13, although the title pages of each book bears a mention of different original English titles, respectively The Saint Meets a Ghost and The Saint Takes Germs. This is almost a unique occurrence, which will be repeated only once more, with No. 46, The Saint Meets a Flying Saucer.

In the absence of a comprehensive list of synopses of the NYH-T strips equivalent to Barer's list of radio script synopses, to which the reader could easily refer, I have elected to provide here brief plot summaries of the French NYH-T pastiches, which may then help those familiar with the strips to match the French novels with their "sources". Certainly, the concept of comic-strips being turned into novelizations remains unique to this day.

In The Saint Discovers Virus 13 (No. 36), Simon fights a nazi scientist, Anton Morgan, and his beautiful, blonde wife, Greta, to prevent the release of the deadly Virus 13. Simon eventually kills Anton but Greta escapes with the money. Greta went on to become a regular opponent in the series, returning in Nos. 43, 47, 53, 62 and 75. She is very much in love with Simon, and always tries to seduce him into joining her nefarious schemes. Naturally, Simon always refuses, at which point Greta, somewhat reluctantly, one feels, attempts to kill him. Conversely, Simon does not seem displeased when, at the end of each novel, Greta manages to escape from the Law.

No. 37, entitled The Saint Plays with Fire (not to be confused with No. 15), takes place in Florida, with the character of Sheriff Haskins (from No. 17) making a return appearance. In it, Simon, Patricia and Hoppy foil a scheme by circus operator Candy Gangelin and lion-tamer Otto to kidnap and ship out scientists.

In the next volume, The Saint vs. the Triangle (No. 38), Simon helps Mary Green fight the villainous Hal Goss and two other criminals known as the Triangle for the secret of a gold mine which she stands to inherit from Mr. Fergus, a dying outlaw who was her grandfather's former business partner. The story takes place in Nevada.

The title of No. 39 said it all: The Saint at the Carnival of Rio. In it, Simon, Patricia and Hoppy fight a famous forger named Magorsky who has taken refuge in Brazil.

Strangely, the next novel was a return to the radio "fix-ups" of the previous period. Entitled The Saint and the Green Parakeet (No. 40), it made use of two Louis Vittes radio scripts: The Case of the Lopsided Triangle and The Case of the Indiscreet Parakeet, as well as other material, presumably borrowed from the NYH-T. In it, Simon defeats Hallister, the head of A.A.A., a Kansas City publisher of crime novels, who blackmails murderers. A green parrot named Oscar provides a vital clue.

(For the record, Dutch publisher A. W. Bruna & Zoon ended up translating the following seven French novels: Nos. 40, 42, 43, 46 to 48 and 50.)

The series then returned to the NYH-T strip for inspiration. Entitled The Saint Condemns Without Appeal, No. 41's plot featured the return of Hamilton, who uses Simon to defeat Noah S. Banson, the head of the Serpent Ring. Banson is revealed to be a foreign spy plotting to set up an enemy base near Pearl Harbor. In a somewhat unusual departure for novels of this period, the Saint actually executes the villain at the end of the story.

In the next book, The Saint Chooses a Painless Death (No. 42), Simon outwits D.F.Jakes, who first offers would-be suicidees a painless death, arranges for them to regain their taste for life, and then threatens to go though with his end of the contract unless they pay him ransom money.

Greta Morgan returned in No. 43, The Saint Hunts for the Blonde, not one of Michel-Tyl's best efforts. In this rather plodding novel, taking place in Los Angeles, Simon encounters Olga Ramos, a.k.a. Greta Morgan, and prevents her from stealing the money that Juan Lobo, a Banana Republic President, is planning to steal before his people kick him out.

In the following volume, The Saint Plays Nursemaid (No. 44), Simon foils the plans of Big Tony, a gangster who is determined to do everything in his power so that his daughter, Lizza, who is unaware of his identity, is happy.

No. 45, much to the average fan's surprise, turned out to be a straightforward translation of Charteris' own collection, The Saint in Europe.

The next book, The Saint Meets a Flying Saucer (No. 46), by contrast, was yet another uninspired NYH-T plot, in which Simon exposes the villainous Dr.Quale who has built a fake flying saucer to extort money from people who believe they have been contacted by an alien named Xot.

The series picked up again with The Saint Becomes a Pirate (No. 47), in which Greta Morgan uses a drug to brainwash the Saint, who then helps her run a pirate ring in the Atlantic. Eventually, Simon, free of the drug's influence, foils her plan to ransom Greek millionaire Kyros Chrysos.

No. 48, entitled The Saint Requests the Head, had the feel of a "fix-up", assembled by Michel-Tyl from three, previously unconnected stories. However, it was not derived from any of the radio scripts. In the first story, the Saint defeats a beauty institute scam in Hollywood. Then, he exposes a blackmailing newspaper, "Dig", and his crooked owner, Grubb. Finally, he uncovers the "head" behind all these rackets: a crooked Sacramento lawyer named Rex Ficks.

The next volume, The Saint Follows the Fashion (No. 49), proved to be one of Michel-Tyl's best efforts during this period. In it, Simon defeats a fashion designer, Valentine, who uses hi-fi equipment to simulate an enemy air attack over London in order to stage a giant burglary. The plot is almost science-fiction. The novel also introduced the only other returning "companion" -- excluding the Charteris-created regulars, such as Patricia Holm, Hoppy Uniatz, etc. -- Joelle Darcenay, a French journalist. Miss Darcenay made a reappearance in No. 53, and considering her considerable charm and spunk, it is a shame that she was not chosen to appear more often in the series.

The next book, entitled First Prize for the Saint (No. 50), was a clever yarn in which Simon defeats New York forger Spats Lieber who plans to use a phony game show to launder fake US bonds, with the unwitting complicity of actor/host Tag Tower.

It was followed by yet one more straightforward translation of a Charteris' short story collection: The Saint on the Spanish Main.

No. 52, entitled I Accuse the Saint, was likely a "fix-up" created out of two stories which just happened to both take place in California. In the first, taking place in San Francisco, the Saint fights a racket preying on Chinese families. Then, the action moves to Hollywood, where Simon outwits movie producer Joe Nemo, who tries to frame him in a diamond robbery case. Naturally, Nemo turns out to have been behind the Chinese racket as well.

Joelle Darcenay returned to help Simon do battle with no less than Greta Morgan once again in No. 53, Greta Wraps up The Saint. In this rather disjointed effort (another "fix-up"?), Simon follows Greta's trail to France, and then to North Africa, where he ends up leading a slave rebellion against Greta and her allies, gun merchant Horace Dumet and the evil Ivanoff.

The title of the next novel translates as Stronger than the Saint (No. 54), but it is a version of Bet on the Saint. This is not a translation of the Fleming Lee version as Lee had not met Leslie in 1958. The stories are the same because they share the same source material, i.e.: a Herald-Tribune comic strip. Michel-Tyl novelized the French version while Lee produced an English language version some years later. The background of the Charteris/Lee collaboration on Bet on the Saint is covered in Burl Barer's book (pages 171-176). This French version is therefore the only published version of this source story.

Bet on the Saint was followed by Hurrah for the Saint (No. 55), a very odd book which read like a quickly-assembled "fix-up" of two stories. In its first part, Simon fights New York crime "bourgeois" Leo Garmish and his lieutenant Halber over the murder of a journalist. The character of Midnight, an enigmatic female antagonist, is introduced. At the end of part one of the book, Michel-Tyl then inserted a note to tell his readers that the events from Nos. 53 and 54 took place here and prevented Simon from completely wrapping up the case, i.e.: putting Leo out of commission. In part two, the action then moves to the French Riviera, where Simon, disguised as a Maharajah, foils Garmish's attempt to rob a Casino. Midnight, too, is back, but she is finally revealed to have been working for Fernack all the time.

Hamilton returned in No. 56, The Spectre of the Saint, in which he employs Simon to unmasks a California spy ring led by Raab, Dancey and Hilda Shane. The three villains throw the Saint into the Pacific Ocean, but he escapes drowning and pretends to be dead. He then returns to spook them up into surrendering.

This book was followed by a translation of Charteris' 1956 collection, The Saint Around The World (released in France in 1959).

For reasons discussed in our next chapter, the quality and interest of the French pastiches then went up markedly, with some of the most interesting books published later in the series.

As we said, the quality and interest of the French pastiches went up markedly in 1959, with some of the most interesting books published later in the series.

Certainly, Leslie Charteris' further and continued intervention may have been one of the reasons. Another is the possible intervention of renowned science fiction writer Harry Harrison who claims to have been involved with the New York Herald-Tribune strips during the years 1955-1961. This is what Mr. Harrison said in an interview:

"I was writing book reviews for The Saint Magazine under Leslie Charteris' name for a small amount of money. I got to do it through a friend of mine, Hans Stefan Santesson, an author who edited Fantastic Universe. Leslie Charteris was doing a comic strip of The Saint and I had comics experience, so I did some outlines and he liked them, and I started working with him doing the comic strips. The scripts were very long, about three months of daily comic, and a number of these were taken by a girl in Paris [Madeleine Michel-Tyl] who wrote them up as novels... [Interviewer's question: She ghosted Saint novels?] From my ghosted comic scripts! There are more Saint books in France than there are in America, so a number of my scripts appeared in France as novels, but never in the States. One of the reasons the strip was killed was because the stories were so long - there should only be three or four weeks in a series for people's attention span. These were three months long - the girl could eventually write a novel from them. So eventually the strip was killed. At that time I had one or two outlines that I had done for comic strips, and I went to see Leslie and he said would you like to expand this into a novel?"

... and Mr. Harrison then goes on describe how he wrote Vendetta for the Saint (1964).

Meanwhile, No. 58, entitled The Saint and the Tyrant, took place in the fictional South American republic of Escudia (Escoria in the NYH-T strip), where Simon helps rebel leader Dr. Cortes overthrow the local tyrant, Borgaz, and his accomplice, Valdinez.

The next volume, Hell Awaits the Saint (No. 59), turned out to be a thrilling pseudo-SF horror story taking place in Haiti. There, Simon defeats a mad scientist, Dr. Zoran, whose rejuvenating machine produces brainless zombies. The descriptions of Zoran's underground citadel are particularly colorful. Hell Awaits the Saint was definitely one of the most exciting books of this period.

Another very good novel immediately followed, which also made use of a pseudo-SF device. In The Saint vs. the Grey Hoods (No. 60), Simon fights the evil Colonel Graw, ring leader of a paramilitary gang of thieves, the Grey Hoods (the Gray Ghosts in the NYH-T strip), who use infra-red glasses to commit burglaries during foggy British nights. It was a properly moody, violent book, yet with all the wry humor associated with the Saint.

Next came The Saint in Paris (No. 61), in which Simon fights the villainous Russian spymaster Varon to save a beautiful French scientist, Marie Latour. France's answer to Teal, and Simon's French nemesis, the hound-like Inspector Quercy, is featured in this novel.

In No. 62, Let's Sacrifice the Saint, Simon is hired by the Gem Merchants Protective Association to thwart the goals of Inga Rolf, a.k.a. Greta Morgan, and her accomplice, Toff Lyken, who have located a lost Inca tribe in Amazonia, and are using local superstitions to steal their treasure of precious emeralds.

The series continued with Thanks to the Saint, a translation of Charteris' 1957 collection (released in France in 1960). The next novel, No. 64, the title of which translates as The Saint Lies In Wait, had as interesting a story as Bet on the Saint. It is, in fact, an alternate version of another Charteris/Fleming Lee collaboration, published in English as The Saint in Pursuit. The story behind this novel is told in Barer's book (pages 175-176). Its plot has Simon travelling from Lisbon to Switzerland to help young Vicky Kinian claim her late father's inheritance (he was an OSS agent). The villain is a murderous Russian spy named Uzdanov. A French motion picture with the same title was released by Intermondie in 1966, bearing little if any resemblance to the book, even though it purported to adapt it. Barer describes the various legal battles which ensued between Charteris and the producers (pages 136-138).

No. 65, entitled The Saint in the Water, moved the action to the Bahamas. In it, Simon fights two villains, Garwell and Luzik, to help his friend Dan Morrow find an underwater treasure.

Then, we were back in England in The Saint Behind the Wheel (No. 66), where the Saint takes part in a cross-country race to protect young automobile engineer Ian Foyle and his fiancée Margaret from the evil schemes of her cousin Charles.

A straightforward translation of Señor Saint, entitled No Holidays for the Saint (No. 67), followed, and then Fayard released one of Michel-Tyl's best efforts, The Saint in Sleeping Beauty's Castle (No.68).

This book takes place in the South of France, which is portrayed witch such charm and local color that one suspects that Leslie Charteris himself had more than a passing involvement in it. Indeed, Mrs. Charteris confirmed that the castle in which the story takes place was inspired by a real castle that she and her husband saw on several of their trips to the South of France. The plot is extremely clever. Simon faces Sir Charles, a British nobleman who has kept his niece, Wendy, living in a fairy tale castle, Château Sorcelou, all her life so that he can have her committed when she turns eighteen, and keep her considerable inheritance for himself. Needless to say, Simon inadvertently uncovers the scheme and breaks into the castle. Wendy, who is now a budding young woman, sees in him the Prince Charming of the stories which are, to her, reality. The Saint in Sleeping Beauty's Castle is a wonderfully written novel, charming, whimsical and yet deadly serious at the same time. It is a high point in the series, a tribute to the excellent collaboration between Charteris and Madeleine Michel-Tyl.

Fayard followed with The Trumps of the Saint (No. 69, 1962), an original collection gathering more stories which had not been previously collected in The Saint Has Fun (No. 24). Why it took Fayard six years to collect these remains a mystery. The Trumps of the Saint contains one story from The Brighter Buccaneer (The Unpopular Landlord), seven stories from The Saint Intervenes and two stories from The Happy Highwayman. As indicated above, some stories still remained untranslated, and would finally be used almost at the very end of the series, in No. 76.

This was the point in the series when Fayard was finally able to acquire the rights to the two seminal Saint novels, Meet the Tiger! and The Last Hero, which had been, until then, Gallimard's property. These two were now released, respectively as No. 70 (Meet the Tiger! being rechristened The Saint and Patricia) and No. 72.

The departure in style was rather abrupt, since in these two books, Simon is portrayed as a youthful adventurer. The novels also clearly take place before the war. On the other hand, in her more recent efforts, Madeleine Michel-Tyl had carefully aged Simon, so that he had become a more mature hero -- not unlike the Roger Moore character in the television series, which was posterior to Michel-Tyl's novelisations. And, of course, the plots took place in a contemporary setting. The absence of specific notes to the reader that should have indicated that these were early Saint adventures -- a definite Fayard editorial lapse -- meant that one had to rely on internal clues and knowledge of the earlier books in the series to make sense of their place in the Saint chronology.

In between these two "classics", Fayard sandwiched yet another excellent Michel-Tyl's adaptation, The Saint in Mexico (No. 71), in which Hamilton sends Simon to Mexico to deal with Inky Schatz, a talented forger of fake dollars. But Schatz has associated himself with a terrific villain, El Tigre. Simon infiltrates El Tigre's gang, and eventually defeats the Mexican bandit and brings Schatz back to the U.S. The Saint in Mexico is a terrific thriller.

It was followed by The Saint in Africa (No. 73). The action took place in the fictional African republic of Kanaba, where Simon defeats Dr. Bogan and his henchman Weedy to help a missionary, Dr. Grey. It turns out that Bogan seeks the secret of a miracle drug, known only to the local tribe, the Zikus. Not unsurprisingly, Simon eventually becomes the new chief of the Ziskus.

The next volume in the series, No. 74, was yet one more translation of a Charteris' short story collection, this time The Saint to the Rescue. It was followed by the last of the Michel-Tyl's pastiches, appropriately entitled The Saint Meets Greta Again (No. 75) -- and one could have added, for the last time. This somewhat melancolic, but otherwise excellent, novel took place again on the French Riviera. This time, Simon thwarts a new plot by Greta Morgan, who steals famous paintings and threatens to destroy them unless insurance companies pay her ransom money. Even though Simon eventually outwits Greta, this is the closest he has ever come to feel more than a passing fancy for her. And when the two enemies part, there is a genuine sense of sadness.

The Saint Meets Greta Again, released in December 1963, marked the creative end of the Fayard Saint series and of the Charteris-Michel-Tyl collaboration. From several books a year, the rhythm of publication now fell to two, then one. The reasons for this decline are unclear, as the popularity of the Saint, boosted by the television series, was on the rise again. Certainly, Fayard actively marketed its considerable backlist during the next six years. But no more pastiches were published, and the series itself, as we shall see, was soon discontinued.

No. 76 in the series, Again the Saint!, released in June 1964, was the third, and last, original collection put together by Fayard from the remaining untranslated short stories from The Brightest Buccaneer which had not been previously used in The Saint Has Fun (No. 24) and The Trumps of the Saint (No. 69).

In October 1964, Fayard released a translation of Trust the Saint (No. 77) and, in January 1966, after skipping an entire year, an heretofore unpecedented event, The Saint in the Sun, No. 78 and last in the series. As I said above, the reasons for the cancellation of the series remain somewhat mysterious. Certainly, the year 1968 was, as everyone knows, a year of turmoil and changes.

Paperbacks became slicker, with more lurid covers on the outside and more sexy scenes inside. It is possible that, compared to some of its more daring competition, the Saint novels may just have felt too outdated.

Also, 1968 heralded a period of economic difficulties, especially for smaller companies. A very likely possibility is that Fayard was no longer as profitable as it had once been. It may have been purchased by a larger corporation. There may have been changes in management. Jenny Bradley's 1969 letter indicates that, aside from Madeleine Michel-Tyl, there was Mr. Didelot and another, unidentified editor, which all had to be paid from the same royalties -- in other words, the series had become "top heavy". All sorts of factors that might have doomed the Saint series.

Vendetta for the Saint (by Harry Harrison and Leslie Charteris), which had first appeared in Le Saint Detective Magazine No. 130 (December 1965) and five subsequent issues, was again serialized in 1967 and 1968 in Télé 7 Jours, the largest French television programme magazine. Considering the popularity of the television series, it would have been a simple matter for Fayard, or even another publisher, to put it out in book form. Yet, it was not done. Another letter from Jenny Bradley revealed that the sale of the subsidiary rights by Fayard to Télé 7 Jours was mismanaged by Fayard.

For the sake of exhaustivity let us also note here that four original short stories initially published in Le Saint Detective Magazine were never collected in the Fayard books:
- Le Noble Sportsman (The Noble Sportsman) in Le Saint Detective Magazine No. 24 (Febr. 1957);
- Le Saint et les Prospecteurs (The Saint and the Prospectors) in Le Saint Detective Magazine No. 112 (June 1964) was adapted by M. Michel-Tyl from a NY Herald Tribune strip (September 13th- November 6th, 1954). In it, Bruce Taylor, a Hollywood writer, buys the rights to adapt the tall tales stories that an old prospector/gold miner Old Man Gibbs likes to tell.
- Amours, Gadgets et Colonel (Love, Gadgets and Colonel) (The Gadget Lovers) from Le Saint Detective Magazine No. 151-152 (Sept.-Oct. 1967), the adaptation by Fleming Lee of a John Kruse teleplay, translated by M. Michel-Tyl, later included in The Saint Returns.
- Un Puissant Artiste (The Power Artist), written with Fleming Lee, in Le Saint Detective Magazine No. 153-154 (Nov.-Dec 1967) was, however, later included in the 1980 Livre de Poche volume Le Saint à la Télévision (1980) (The Saint on TV) but in a different translation.

For a gallery of all the covers of Le Saint Detective Magazine, click here.

Finally, as we pointed out before, one original Leslie charteris story, The Uncritical Publisher (from The Saint Intervenes) was not translated at all, although there is an orginal 1945 French-Canadian translation of that collection entitled Le Saint intervient (published by Editions Modernes Ltée.) and it is likely that that story is included there, but translated by Madeleine Didayer.

Within the space of a couple of years, certainly by 1970, even the colorful Fayard books had vanished from the newstands. It was as if the Saint had died. Gone. Vanished.

Soon after the publication of the last Fayard Saint book, the popular reprint collection Le Livre de Poche began reissuing virtually all of the Saint novels, starting in 1967 with The Saint in New York (No. 1) and ending up with The Saint Plays Nursemaid (No. 44) in 1978.

For a gallery of the covers of all the Livre de Poche editions, click here.

Le Livre de Poche also issued four Charteris "collaborations": The Saint and the Hapsburg Necklace by Christopher Short in 1977, The Saint and the Forgers (Catch the Saint) by Fleming Lee & Norman Worker and The Saint on TV by Fleming Lee & John Kruse in 1980, and finally, The Saint Gets Angry (The Saint in Trouble) by Graham Weaver, John Kruse & Terence Feely in 1981.

Interestingly, Jenny Bradley had stated in a 1973 letter that she had been preparing contracts for Fayard editions of The Saint and the Fiction Makers by Fleming Lee and John Kruse, The Saint Abroad by Fleming Lee and Michael Pertwee and The Saint and the People Importers by Fleming Lee and Leslie Charteris. However, these books were never published. Undoubtedly, the Fall of the House of Fayard was responsible.

In any event, sometime in the mid-1980s, the Livre de Poche editions, too, were allowed to become out of print.

For the record, the following other Saint novels were not translated either:
- The Saint in Pursuit (a Fleming Lee/Charteris collaboration), in its original form;
- The Saint Returns (by Fleming Lee, D. R. Motton, Leigh Vance and John Kruse) (except for one story, The Gadget Lovers, published in a translation by M. Michel-Tyl in Le Saint Detective Magazine Nos. 151-152);
- Send for the Saint (by Peter Bloxsom, John Kruse and Donald James);
- The Saint and the Templar Treasure (by Graham Weaver and Donne Avenell);
- Count on the Saint (by Graham Weaver and Donne Avenell); and
- Salvage for the Saint (by Peter Bloxsom and John Kruse).

In 1989, 10/18, an upscale "classic mysteries" paperback series put out by editors Christian Bourgois and Jean-Claude Zylberstein at the Presses de la Cité, reprinted three Saint books. They were: The Saint in New York (No. 1), The Saint versus Scotland Yard (No. 7) and Thieves' Picnic (No. 10). According to Mr. Zylberstein, these were not very successful, and no further reprints are planned.

In the mid-1990s, Belgian publisher Claude Lefrancq began publishing a new series of Saint reprints in two different imprints: one was omnibus volumes featuring several novels; the other was straightforward reprint of the Fayard volumes, featuring the original cover art, framed by a giant Saint signature. They reprinted Nos. 2, 3, 72 (The Last Hero), 6 and 11 of the Fayard series.

Lefrancq went out of business in 1998 and this reprint series, too, was eventually terminated.

In 1997/98, another French publisher, Librio, reprinted stand-alone Charteris short stories in slim, inexpensive volumes: LE SAINT: EN PETITES COUPURES; LE SAINT: IMPOT SUR LE CRIME; LE SAINT: PAR ICI LA MONNAIE!; LE SAINT ENTRE EN SCENE and UNE AVENTURE DU SAINT: LE POLICIER FANTÔME.

A French translation of the novelization of the Val Kilmer movie by Burl Barer was published in 1999 to coincide with the release of the movie.

For a gallery of all the covers of other miscellaneous French editions of the Saint, click here.

I began this article by stating that there was remarkably little information about the French Saint series, even in France, and whatever information had trickled back to England or America had conveyed the impression that these books were not good.

Even the most comprehensive Saint bibliographies, which list novelisations of television stories over which Charteris had little control, or Burl Barer's wonderful posthumous pastiche, ignore the forty-four French Saint novels, all credited to Charteris.

Yet, two of these include direct translations of the legendary Charteris/Fleming Lee collaborations (Nos. 54 & 64).

Nine were based on radio scripts over which Charteris also had little control -- these are the ones which, after being translated back into English, conveyed a negative impression. Yet, these are hardly better or worse than the Bloxsom or Kruse novelisations, which still appear in Charteris bibliographies.

Finally, a whopping 33 novels were based on Charteris plots, incorporated (in translation) Charteris dialogue drawn from the Charteris-written New York Herald-Tribune strip. These cannot but be considered full-blown Charteris collaborations.

It is worth noting that the French Saint books were successfully translated in Dutch for many years, and that French Saint cover artist Regino Bernad went on to design the covers of an early German edition as well, two more tributes to the lasting influence of the Fayard edition in Continental Europe.

How long will these books continue to be ignored because bibliographers don't care, or only read English?

I may not have answered all the questions which remain, but if nothing else, I hope to have contributed to dispel this bit of "English Spoken Only" prejudice and restore into the Charteris canon this enormous and heretofore uncovered contribution.

Certainly, from both a quantitative and qualitative standpoint, Edmond and especially Madeleine Michel-Tyl's collaborative work deserves much recognition among Saint fans.

The success of the Saint books even encouraged Fayard in 1948 to start publishing French editions of the Nero Wolfe (a.k.a. "L'Homme aux Orchidées" -- The Orchid Man) novels by Rex Stout, and John Creasey's The Toff, rechristened The Prince. Before the war, Fayard had also published five New Adventures of Raffles by Barry Perown. Later, in the 1950s, they would release a French edition of The Saint Detective Magazine as well. They also published three new Fantômas books by Marcel Allain.

It is interesting to observe that Fayard deliberately copied the design of its famous Saint covers, using the haloed stick figure designed and trademarked by Leslie Charteris, in order to attract readers to its other series: the Nero Wolfe covers featured a rotund, orchid-bearing, stick figure, while those of the Prince bore a top-hat-wearing, monocled one. Considering Charteris' well-documented attempts to protect his trademark, it is remarkable that no attempts were made to stop Fayard from doing this.

In any event, and in spite of this clever bit of cover design, the Nero Wolfe and Prince series failed to attract the same, huge following than that of the Saint books. They were abandoned in 1950, after more than twenty Nero Wolfes and fourteen Princes had been published. (It is also possible that Fayard simply lost the rights to publish them.)

Meanwhile, Fayard, having by then run out of original Leslie Charteris' Saint stories, embarked on an aggressive program to manufacture their own. From then on, the Saint would become, and remain until its own discontinuation in 1966, Fayard's premier crime/adventure series.

For a gallery of all the Nero Wolfe covers, click here; of all The Toff covers, click here; of Fantomas & other Fayard imprints, click here.

Three Saint radio adaptations were broadcast on Radio-Sottens, a Swiss-based, French-language radio channel, as part of the ENIGMES ET AVENTURES (Enigmas & Adventures) anthology show.

The numbering of the stories refers to the Fayard catalog.

Le Saint à Miami (No. 17) (11 & 15 July 1949) (Adapt: Roland Jay)
Le Saint à Hollywood (incl. in No. 20) (18 & 22 July 1949) (Adapt: Roland Jay)
L'Homme qui ne pouvait pas mourir (incl. in No. 18) (25 & 29 July 1949) (Adapt: Roland Jay)

The size of the Fayard volumes were standardized at 222 pages. Consequently, the Michel-Tyls had to cut down and edit Charteris' original English prose in order to fit the format, while striving to retain his idiosyncratic charm and flavor. We have randomly selected the first few opening paragraphs of The Beauty Specialist, translated as Le Saint contre Mr. Z (Fayard No. 16), as a sample above.

This article first appeared in a slightly different form in the Summer '94 issue of The Epistle.

Thanks to Ian Dickerson for Research Assist, Burl Barer and Jean-Luc Buard for additional information. Thanks to Jacques Baudou, Dan Bodenheimer, Marcel Bernadac, Jean-Pierre Bourgeron, Rinus Daane, Ian Dickerson, Rémi Dienis, Olivier Jaspart, Hillebrand Komrij, Charles Moreau, Gerard Nijmeijer, Patrick Verdant and Terry Morris for additional cover scans. Also thanks to Jacques Baudou and Dominique from the Bibliothèque des Littératures Policieres.