From Holland and Flanders
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
10BOOKS18-1-VJ2009-DEF.qxd 20-04-2009 13:19 Pagina 1 no.18-1 10 Booksprings 2009 from Holland and Flanders Abdelkader Benali Erwin Mortier Allard Schröder Jan Brokken Vonne van der Meer Michel van Eeten Bernlef Stefan Hertmans Herman Koch Paul Baeten Gronda 10BOOKS18-1-VJ2009-DEF.qxd 20-04-2009 13:19 Pagina 2 2 The migrant’s leap into the dark Abdelkader Benali My Mother’s Voice n My Mother’s Voice (De stem van I2mijn moeder) Abdelkader Benali returns to his roots and his discovery of literature when twenty-years old. As in Wedding by the Sea (Bruiloft aan zee), the cheerful, quirky debut written in 1995 which was successful all over photo Tessa Posthuma de Boer Europe, his new novel – written in an exuber- ant mix of styles and influences – tells a story which reaches a resounding Abdelkader Benali (b. 1975) wrote his debut, climax. Bruiloft aan zee (Wedding by the Sea, 1996), ‘I was a dodo who tried to fly to paradise to lay an egg,’ says the protagonist aged 21. This astonishing novel, about a of My Mother’s Voice, a successful young photographer. It’s a wonderful pic- Dutch Moroccan who goes back to his home ture of his creator, Abdelkader Benali, a cosmopolitan writer whose illiterate country in search of his sister’s deserted parents emigrated from Morocco to The Netherlands. Benali is that dodo. bridegroom, received the Geertjan Lubber- The photographer is recalled to his parental house in Rotterdam where his huizen Prize. Benali was awarded the Libris mother is seriously ill. She has not spoken for years, eating, drinking and Literature Prize for his second novel, De praying in silence. When her son gets to speak on the phone not only to his langverwachte (The Long-Awaited, 2002). He desperate father, but to his mother too, he knows that he needs to go home.’ has since published the novels Laat het At home, it slowly becomes clear why the mother was silent for so long: morgen mooi weer zijn (Let Tomorrow Be Fine, her son had a twin, who had died in a tragic accident in Morocco when still 2005) and Feldman en ik (Feldman and I, very young. What happened is gradually revealed by a report the dead boy 2006). He also writes plays and occasional had written for his Dutch teacher about a journey in a yellow Mercedes pieces of journalism. In 2005, with the histo- 200 D with his parents, his brother and a ten-kilo jar of peanut butter. rian Herman Obdeijn, he published Marokko That ill-fated journey led to his death, made the father unhappy, rendered door Nederlandse ogen 1605-2005 (Morocco the mother dumb and made his twin brother, the future photographer, flee Through Dutch Eyes 1605-2005). the house, which is filled with guilt and resentment. The tragic story is a metaphor for the leap into the dark which migrants make in order to suc- ceed in a new world. Or in order to return from the new world to the old. Some, like the young photographer, much in demand for quality work, A beautifully narrated account of a fear of apparently succeed. And yet the photographer cannot commit to his wife commitment, letting go and growing up, cast in a and sons, also twins. Others, with identical qualifications, fail hopelessly. Cain and Abel mould of two competing brothers. Abdelkader Benali’s My Mother’s Voice exposes, without cliché, without being de telegraaf predictable, the painful inner conflict and tragic fate of migrant children and their parents – ‘Migration has scattered us across this continent like The new novel by Abdelkader Benali responds to poppy seeds on the stale bread that is Europe. We come together to play an the question of what it is like to belong to the first imaginary drum, sing songs of the olden days and reminisce. Oblivion kills or second generation of immigrant workers. the heart of the migrant. If his children forget him, the migration monster boek will have consumed every scrap of his being.’ publishing details rights other titles in translation De stem van mijn moeder De Arbeiderspers La vedova spagnola (Laat het morgen mooi weer zijn), Rome: Fazi, 2007. Also in (2009) Herengracht 370-372 Portuguese (Lisbon: Teorema, in prep.). 224 pp nl – 1016 ch Amsterdam Ibn Khaldoun in Hollandia Felix (compilation), London: Banipal, 2007. tel.: +31 20 524 75 00 Largamente esperada (De langverwachte). Barcelona: Mondadori, 2006). Also in fax: +31 20 622 49 37 Italian (Rome: Fazi, 2005, 2006), in Portuguese (Lisbon: Teorema, in prep.), and in e-mail: French (Arles: Actes Sud, in prep.). [email protected] Wedding by the sea (Bruiloft aan zee). London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1999 / website: Phoenix, 2000. Also in Italian (Milan: Marcos y Marcos, 2000), in German www.arbeiderspers.nl (Munich; Zürich: Piper, 1998) and in many other languages. 10BOOKS18-1-VJ2009-DEF.qxd 20-04-2009 13:19 Pagina 3 3 Major history and minor humans Erwin Mortier Divine Sleep he First World War is the main T2theme of Erwin Mortier’s new novel Godenslaap (Divine Sleep), its magnitude and impact taking form in the recollections jarred down daily by the elderly Helena in her notebooks. Helena’s father was a pros- perous Flemish merchant, and her mother photo Roeland Fossen a Walloon from a rich family in French Flanders. She has fond memories of summer holidays at her uncle’s large country house in France before the Marcel (1999), the first novel by Erwin Mortier war, which is where, when war breaks out, she is sent by her father with (b. 1965), was awarded several prizes and nomi- her mother and siblings, in the hope that this will prevent her brother nated for the most important literary prizes of Edgar from volunteering for military service. No one can predict that an the Netherlands and Flanders. With his important part of the war will be fought in that part of the country. following novels Mijn tweede huid (My Fellow Erwin Mortier splendidly elaborates the contrast in character between Skin, 2000) and Sluitertijd (Shutterspeed, 2002) the enterprising Helena and her respectable, matronly mother. She is not and the novella Alle dagen samen (All Days enthusiastic about Helena’s relationship with Matthew, a British Army Together, 2004) he quickly built up a reputa- photographer (who will later become her husband). Helena visits front- tion as one a prominent author of his genera- line trenches with him, but then their ways part. Surprisingly, it is tion. Erwin Mortier often allows children to through the mother that Helena meets him again when she goes with her evolve innocently and unconsciously under to visit the wounded Edgar at the hospital where Matthew happens to be the emotional fall out of the complex lives of lodging. That same evening, the hospital comes into the firing line and adults who are carrying a burden from the the two women witness scenes of indescribable horror. past. A grand stylist, his evocative descriptions How can the personal dislocation of war be recorded so as not to fade or brilliantly bring past worlds to life. diminish? In her memoirs, Helena wishes to master words in order to describe the indescribable, but she puts this attempt into perspective: ‘can we ever do anything else, I ask myself, but tell fairy stories burdened with footnotes?’ Mortier writes so well that you are inclined to see This ‘anything else’ is what Erwin Mortier convincingly achieves in everything else as of secondary importance. Godenslaap. First he paints a fresco of ‘the entire propriety of good citizen- nrc handelsblad ship and norms.’ During the war, this world collapses in ruin and most characters are concerned only with trying to remain human in inhuman Splendid control of language de volkskrant circumstances. Nothing spectacular happens in the story; Mortier is more concerned with animating such concepts as war, history and the past, If Marcel Proust had a descendant somewhere in imaginatively, with great empathy and engagement, with a mixture of Flanders, he must be born in Ghent. knack melancholy, qualification and resignation. Its theme complements the novels of Ian McEwan and Philippe Claudel, while its monumental, yet A monumental, phenomenal book. de morgen subtly style it reminiscent of Marcel Proust and Virginia Woolf. publishing details rights other titles in translation Godenslaap (2008) De Bezige Bij Marcel (Marcel). Harvill, 2001 / Vintage, 2003. Also in Bulgarian (Veliko 405 pp Van Miereveldstraat 1 Tarnovo: PIC, 2001), in French (Paris: Fayard, 2003), in German (Frankfurt am nl – 1071 dw Amsterdam Main: Suhrkamp, 2001), and in Portuguese (Lisbon: Caminho, in prep.) tel.: +31 20 305 98 10 My Fellow Skin (Mijn tweede huid). London: Harvill, 2003. Also in German fax: +31 20 305 98 24 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2004), and in French (Paris: Fayard, 2004) e-mail: Shutterspeed (Sluitertijd) London: Harvill Secker, 2007. Also in German [email protected] (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2007), and in French (Paris: Fayard, 2005). website: www.debezigebij.nl Les dix doigts des jours (Alle dagen samen) Paris: Fayard, 2007. 10BOOKS18-1-VJ2009-DEF.qxd 20-04-2009 13:19 Pagina 4 4 Chasing ghosts on Chinese hell’s island Allard Schröder Amoy ovels by Allard Schröder invari- N3ably take place in a shadowy realm, on the borders of life and death. The setting always has its own peculiar significance – due partly to Schröder’s marvellous descriptions of atmosphere and landscape. Amoy is set on Go Long Su, which the famous Dutch poet and ship’s doctor J. Slauerhoff called in his work ‘Spring photo Anja van Wijgerden Island’, off the coast of Amoy, the Chinese port.