Cees Buddingh' (1918–1985)

For a change, the 1975 Boekenweek gift was not a novella but an anthology of (very) short travel-themed stories and poems by twenty-three more or less well known Dutch and Flemish writers. It was also a departure from the usual very conservative book-design ethos of Boekenweek, a feast of Dutch seventies style, with four-column text in a puzzling alternation of fonts and styles over heavily cropped black and white photos by Steye Raviez and with lots of nods to the iconic design language of show more the Boekenweek sponsor, Dutch Railways. Guaranteed to give you a headache if you try to read it on a train…

Interestingly, the most frequent form of transport represented here is the ship, with Jan Hanlo crossing the Irish Sea in a storm, Gerard Reve taking a cargo ship to England, Paul van Ostaijen describing his friend Scholem’s voyages to Asia, and Dr A Alberts setting out for the Dutch East Indies in 1939. But we get plenty of trains, and it’s the seventies so there is a fair amount of hitch-hiking too. Willem Elsschot gives us the road-trip to the Ardennes that opens Het Tankschip, and there are a couple of memorable taxi-rides, and some practical advice on bike-tours by Bob den Uyl (city-dwellers should take a cloth soaked in exhaust fumes to sniff in case all that fresh air gets a bit too much). Aviation seems to have been (almost) forgotten, appearing only briefly in a poem by Leo Vroman on the last pages of the book.

Fun, but the design definitely belongs in a museum and not on the bookshelf! show less

A capricious short novel, that is fun to read, but quite nonsensical.

Dit dagboek uit begin jaren 70 na 35 jaar nog eens herlezen. Het staat nog steeds als een huis! En het stimuleert me om nog eens wat meer van Buddingh' te herlezen, heb de Ode aan de Yorkshire Dales er nog eens bijgepakt. Was ook leuk dat we laatst de kastjes in het Dordrechts Museum hebben gezien.

Brilliant, long poems about animals, in which Buddingh' tells us about human behaviour!