New Dutch Writers:

Citizenkelly posted the finalists for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2008 on another thread and I picked out the two Dutch authors out of interest, and in the hopes of discovering new Dutch authors...........

The two Dutch finalists with their respective book titles are:

Erwin Mortier with Shutter speed

and

Paul Verhaeghen with Omega Minor

Here is a link to Omega Minor and a review on LT as the touchstones do not work.

Has anyone read them or have any comment about these authors?

Karen, I don't know Shutter speed, but I did read Mijn tweede huid, a novel that appeared in translation in 2003, then called My fellow skin. I love this book. Simple language, but subtle, not plain. About a boy growing up in the Flemish countryside. Gradually love develops between him and a fellow student. Fate intervenes.
When I write it down like that, it sounds bog standard at best, perhaps much worse. But Mortier manages to convey a maximum of emotion by being very low key and yet poetic.

I also know Vergeten licht, a volume of poetry, which I was very much looking forward to after reading My fellow skin. I found it disappointing and strangely the opposite of his novel: less restrained in form and language, and therefore spelling out things too much, to my taste anyway.

I don't know much about Verhaeghen, but both Mortier and he are Flemish, which means you might refer to them as 'New writers in Dutch' rather than call them 'Dutch writers'. Dutch/Flemish identities: a sensitive issue. It's a bit like calling a Scotsman English...

So a couple more books to bog down my internet shopping bag - I elected to buy Shutter speed but not Omega Minor (the review was a bit off putting which is really not fair), and also the Erwin Mortier book suggested by Knarf which sounds really good - thanks for the information on this one.

Interesting about the Flemish/Dutch sensitivity - perhaps we should refer to Netherlands writers as either Dutch or Flemish. Is that the politically correct jargon??

Karen/Knarf - I have Shutter Speed in my pile and may pick it up shortly, so look forward to sharing views.

I have a couple of books of dutch poetry in translation, but haven't read them yet. One translated by J M Coetzee. Unfortunatley I have not been able to get a translation of Vondell's work in English though.

Caroline, unfortunately your search won't have been helped by misspelling the name: it's actually Vondel (pronounce as 'fondle', but with v instead of f). For more: see the new thread on Theatre in The Low Countries. (To discuss Vondel as a New Dutch Writer would be a bit of a stretch...)

Someone, however, who might be styled a New Dutch Writer, is Gerbrand Bakker (born 1962), whose first novel for adults I absolutely recommend. Boven is het stil is a sensitive portrait of a farmer who is being forced to take stock: his father is dying, and events and people from the past catch up with him. He decides to change the quiet routine of his country life.
Gerbrand Bakker simply knows how to write and knows how to write simply. Yet the result is a multi-layered book. In my reading group we all agreed on the quality of this novel. Sometimes such agreement means there is little discussion. In this case we spent a good couple of hours exploring this beautiful book.

For more information go to this page.

Boven is het stil has been translated as The twin (Harvill Secker, 2008).

Frank - thanks so much for the suggestion of 'The Twin'. I managed to buy a secondhand copy on Abebooks, so look forward to reading it.

I also received Beyond Sleep by Willem Frederik Hermans in the mail today, so look forward to this book soon, as well.

ETA Touchstone for The Twin predictably not working!

The jewish messiah has just been published. Has anyone read it? Or anything else by Arnon Grunberg

I have just finished reading Shutter speed by Erwin Mortier and can definitely recommend it. It seems like I am reading a lot of memoir-type books at the moment and this is a good contrast to Andrew Motion's nonfiction memoir, In the Blood - a memoir of my childhood.

Both these authors therefore have a very poetic and lyrical style about their prose. They both write in a meditative and evocative style to create and set simple scenes that set the picture of childhood firmly in the reader's eye.

Shutterspeed is very clever, using the idea of old photographs to piece together memory and recall of parents, especially the father. I will not reveal all, except to say it is a very worthwhile read. Anyone else read it?

Karen, Shutterspeed is near the top of my pile of reading. I'll get back to you once I've read it.

Marvas, no I have not even heard of Grunberg. I clicked on the touchstone and the cover looks intriguing at least. I am tempted to order it!!

My review of Shutterspeed is here

#11 Karen, I think you could compare him to Jonathan Safran Foer and Dave Eggers. But he is much more mischievous, his humour has a devilish streak to it. (sorry, can't spell this morning)

Just finished reading Shutterspeed and I think it's a lovely book. As with My fellow skin, the story is 'small'. But then, we're all aware of some 'small event' that changed our life forever. And the language is simply beautiful - evocative, using original metaphors that at no point feel artificial at all.

And isn't it fun that I, as a Dutch native speaker, got to read this book because it was pointed out to me by some English lady in Vancouver?! I love that...
Thanks, Karen.

You are welcome, Knarf.

I imagine you read the original language version!

On a side note - although not Dutch - just read The Words - the autobiography of Jea-Paul Sartre. This was a good comparison to Motion and Mortier - a memoir suffused with the intensity of childhood. Quite different, more philosophical, again touching (but not Dutch).