The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsene Lupin Gentleman Burglar

Maurice Marie Émile Leblanc (11 December 1864 – 6 November 1941) was a French novelist and writer of short stories, known primarily as the creator of the fictional gentleman thief and detective Arsene Lupin, often described as a French counterpart to Arthur Conan Doyle’s creation Sherlock Holmes. The first Arsene Lupin story appeared in a series of short stories that were serialized in the magazine Je sais tout, starting in No. 6, dated 15 July 1905. Clearly created at editorial request, it’s possible that Leblanc had also read Octave Mirbeau’s Les 21 jours d’un neurasthénique (1901), which features a gentleman thief named Arthur Lebeau, and he had seen Mirbeau’s comedy Scrupules (1902), whose main character is a gentleman thief.