Daphne Woodward was a translator of French literature

French literature

French literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak traditional languages of France other than French. Literature written in French language, by citizens...

 into the English language

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

. In particular, she was responsible for translating eight books in the Inspector Maigret series by the Belgian detective writer Georges Simenon

Georges Simenon

Georges Joseph Christian Simenon was a Belgian writer. A prolific author who published nearly 200 novels and numerous short works, Simenon is best known for the creation of the fictional detective Maigret.-Early life and education:...

. These were commissioned by Hamish Hamilton

Hamish Hamilton

Hamish Hamilton Limited was a British book publishing house, founded in 1931 eponymously by the half-Scot half-American Jamie Hamilton . Confusingly, Jamie Hamilton was often referred to as Hamish Hamilton...

 during the 1950s and 1960s and gained wider popularity through the Penguin

Penguin Books

Penguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...

 Maigret series. They included Maigret and the Enigmatic Lett (1963), a translation of the very first novel in the series, Pietr-le-Letton

Pietr-le-Letton

The Strange Case of Peter the Lett , a detective novel by the Belgian writer Georges Simenon, is the very first novel to feature Inspector Jules Maigret who would later feature in more than a hundred stories by Simenon and who has become a legendary figure in the annals of detective fiction.-See...

, first published in 1931.