Maurice Leblanc

He wanted to be Maupassant. A magazine asked for a thief. Ten years of psychological novels the critics liked and the public ignored. Then Je sais tout wanted a French answer to Holmes, and Arsène Lupin walked in — gentleman, burglar, and a career that would not let go. Leblanc tried to escape him: other detectives, science fiction, an earthquake that welds England to France. The thief kept merging them back. Rouen sent him. Paris made him. Lupin paid the rent and took the name.