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On botox, nightmares and humour: 8 life questions to Tatiana de Rosnay

The novel Her Name was Sarah (nine million copies sold) made Tatiana de Rosnay world-famous. In Paris, she even wears a wig when she does not want to be recognised. That she struggled with anorexia she kept secret for years. [bol_product_links block_id="bol_592be29ab4765_selected-products" products="9200000075700087,1001004010207707,9200000077515228,9200000011255053″ name="a4m" sub_id="de rosnay" link_color="003399″ subtitle_color="000000″ pricetype_color="000000″ price_color="CC3300″ deli... You can now log in to continue reading! Welcome to the archive of... 

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In search of Carthage. Drawings by Elisa Pesapane at the National Museum of Antiquities

In the commission given to artist Elisa Pesapane by the National Museum of Antiquities, her passions came together: drawing, antiquity, research and portraiture. From today, twelve drawings about 'le solitaire des ruines': the military engineer Jean Emile Humbert, in search of the city of Carthage, are on display at the RMO. Artist Elisa Pesapane Portrait The Italian-Dutch artist Elisa Pesapane (b 1977)... 

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Sheila Hicks, Escalade Beyond Chromatic Lands -2016-2017- Arsenal-End-wall

Venice Biennale emphasises soft forces in art

The 57th Venice Biennale brings the world together and the art world to Venice. This year, the biennial art event is bigger than ever. Here you will find out what is 'trending' in contemporary art. Everyone thinks something of this event and we live in a time when everything and everyone is held up to the yardstick: 'Have you been there?.... 

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Long live the pedometer! 5 books you'll want to read in May

Bark Skins Annie Proulx We had to gather some courage to start Annie Proulx's Bark Skins. After all, the book is 800 pages long, so you have to make some time for it. But this novel is well worth that. As a reader, you are unceremoniously planted in the wild forest of North America, still called New France in the late seventeenth century.... 

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Festival BRU-TAAL: 5 reasons to travel to Bruges now

See, the Belgians do that well. When a new literary festival comes along, it immediately lasts more than a whole week instead of two days. Today marks the start of the first edition of the International Literature Festival BRU-TAAL. Five reasons to travel to 'the Venice of the North' in the coming days: Bruges. 9 days, 2 weekends, almost 59 writers,... 

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On being Jewish, acceptance and ambition: 8 life questions to Jonathan Safran Foer

He finds himself lazy and under-ambitious, and struggles with acceptance - of himself, of others, of the world. Because his grandparents had lived through the Holocaust, there was a taboo on being unhappy in his youth. Eight life questions to Jewish-American writer Jonathan Safran Foer. 'Between what I could do and actually do, there is a big gap.' 1.... 

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Arnold Schoenberg is dead, long live Arnold Schoenberg!

Arnold Schoenberg (1874-1951) is often accused of driving audiences out of the hall with his drive for innovation. After all, his twelve-tone system swept away the foundations of tonality, which had provided listeners with a safe haven for centuries. Deprived of its foothold, it would have turned its back on contemporary music forever. Nonsense, because not only did Schoenberg write fantastic works, but also... 

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Mira Feticu interviews Mircea Cărtărescu: 'My readers deserve a medal'

Earlier this year, Mircea Cărtărescu, Romania's greatest writer, was a guest at the Winternachten festival. Writer Mira Feticu, who was born and grew up in Romania and even received lectures from Cărtărescu as a student, interviewed her former compatriot and professor for A Quattro Mani. A beautiful conversation about their homeland, truth, literature and poetry. 'My books are... 

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From Huntington to Babylon: the 7 books you definitely want to read in April

Babylon Yasmina Reza With her novel Babylon, Yasmina Reza won the prix Renaudot, France's most important literary prize after the prix Goncourt. The main character is 62-year-old Elisabeth Jauze. Elisabeth is a patent examiner at the Institute Pasteur and leads a sedate life with her husband Pierre. In contrast to her sister Jeanne, who has been caught up in sexual adventures since separation that... 

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Frieda Mulisch: 'I'm not going to be doubted by what others say about me'

Adultery, lustful sex and desperately dating forty-somethings - these are the spicy ingredients of caSINO, Frieda Mulisch's debut novel. On their quest for true love, her protagonists Polly and Sam scour dating app caSINO, a kind of Tinder. We talk to her about her book, literary aspirations and, of course, her father Harry Mulisch. 'If Tinder had been around fifty years ago,... 

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Jan van Mersbergen: 'As thriller writer Frederik Baas, I feel freer'

We know him from such wonderful novels as To the Other Side of the Night and The Last Escape, but Jan van Mersbergen has more to his credit. He recently surprised us with The Rider, written from the perspective of an old horse, and now there is Diary from the River. Not a novel, but his first thriller, published under the pseudonym Frederik Baas.... 

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Anyone can be a hero. Rachel van de Pol on saving the world (or at least a little bit)

You can dream of a better world, but why not take action yourself? Journalist Rachel van de Pol (33) decided to do a good deed every day for a year, from asking for a doggy bag at a restaurant to ragging the neighbours' windows or handing out ice creams to construction workers at... 

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Jan Martens in Utrecht: bravado, unintended honesty and unabashed desire

While Jan Martens' latest work, The Common People (2016), was at Amsterdam's Stadschouwburg last weekend, Utrecht's Theater Kikker is showing two older hits this week: Sweat Baby Sweat (2011) and The dog days are over (2014). Sweat and Dogdays are blockbusters and have already toured the world. At Kikker, they can now be seen as part of a... 

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Jan Geurtz: 'Long live the relationship crisis!'

Is your relationship just on the rocks or is it in dire straits? Congratulations! According to author and spiritual teacher Jan Geurtz, a major love crisis is the chance to be freed from all the patterns that torment you. He describes why this is so in his new book About Love and Letting Go. Even if you have been in it for years... 

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Geert Viaene: 'Poetry is like a drug, I can't live without it'

He was belatedly gripped by poetry, but how: for Flemish poet and street musician Geert Viaene (1963), poetry has now become a condition of life. 'A chord has been struck that still can't stop vibrating.' From this late bloomer, who published on digital forum Het Gezeefde Gedicht (The Sifted Poem), the debut collection Eistijden was recently published. Viaene understands the art of being outspoken in... 

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Lars Kepler: 'A thriller is not a Ravensburger painting'

Their thriller series about detective Joona Linna has sold millions of copies worldwide. The crime novels by Swedish couple Ahndoril, better known as Lars Kepler, are also very popular in the Netherlands. Their readers are not the only ones who get nightmares from them, Alexander and Alexandra Ahndoril tell us. 'After our first book, we had to move.' On the small table, between... 

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Photographer Ed van der Elsken liked to colour outside the lines

If he could have, photographer Ed van der Elsken would have preferred to have a camera built into his head, to capture the world twenty-four hours a day. What he did manage to make are countless beautiful photographs, films and books. The Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam shows his rich legacy at the major exhibition The camera in love. He was... 

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Writer Annelies Verbeke: 'There is an apocalyptic atmosphere about my collection'

Belgian writer Annelies Verbeke cleverly combines seriousness and absurdism in her new collection of short stories Halleluja. The collection once again makes clear why the Belgian writer has sometimes been called the 'diva of the short story'. Like all her work, the new collection Halleluja contains, in addition to a more serious touch, plenty of funny, absurdist and sometimes even surrealistic situations and... 

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'But everyone actually wants to die, don't they?'

Actress and cabaret performer Yora Rienstra (35) knows at first hand what depression can do to a person's life: her grandmother was manic-depressive. That is why she agreed when she was asked to perform in the solo show PAAZ, even though after seven years of cabaret she did not want to be on stage alone again. 'But I found Myrthe van der Meer's book... 

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Holland on the sofa: 'I suffer from strong mood swings' #wu17

'In schools, you have to feed children literature like they feed geese in France.' With his witty remarks, Tommy Wieringa got the laughs as he lay on the sofa as the personification of the Netherlands with psychiatry professor Damiaan Denys. 'The Netherlands on the sofa' was one of the first programmes of the Saturday evening literary festival Winternachten in... 

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Salena Godden: 'This city is a pigeon, hobbling with one mangled foot'

During the Winternachten festival this Saturday, seven writers shared their story about their 'Secret City'. Mircea Cartarescu, Rodigro Hasbún, Hanna Bervoets, Piotr Ibrahim Kalwas, Olga Grjasnowa, Maarten van der Graaff and Salena Godden wrote about the city they don't see when they walk out the door, but encounter once in a while, suddenly, unexpectedly. They wrote fiction, or stayed closer... 

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Salena Godden on #wn17: 'This city is a pigeon stumbling along on one mutilated leg'

In 'My Secret City' on Saturday at the Winternachten festival, seven writers recited a story about 'their own hidden city': Mircea Cartarescu, Rodigro Hasbún, Hanna Bervoets, Piotr Ibrahim Kalwas, Olga Grjasnowa, Maarten van der Graaff and Salena Godden wrote about the city they don't see when they walk out the door, but encounter occasionally and unexpectedly. In fiction,... 

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It's not America here... or is it? #WN17 #WU17

Whether the end of communism and beginning of capitalism influenced his writing? Mircea Cartarescu, one of Romania's greatest writers, parried the question with a joke. 'That is far too small an event to change my style and novels,' Romanian writer Mircea Cartarescu. ©Marc Brester/AQM Is this the real life? That's the theme... 

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Michel Faber: 'Writing is an act of protest' #wu17

It was a beautiful and disarming lecture by Australian-Dutch writer Michel Faber, yesterday at the Friday Night Unlimited of the literary festival Winternachten, in his hometown The Hague. His lecture was on 'Fiction in times of fake'. 'Before I start making lofty statements about literature and what literature is capable of in today's world, I want to be open with... 

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Getting more creative? Work in low light

It may be our friend or foe, but it is a basic necessity of life for every human being: light. Yet we know very little about it, journalist Gemma Venhuizen realised, although for several years she has noticed sometimes sharp differences in her state of mind. For articles, she sometimes travels to countries where it barely gets dark, discovering the euphoria that the abundance... 

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