It is perhaps his most ambitious novel to date, and at the same time the first he would rather not talk about. For in De Mitsukoshi Troostbaby Company, writer Auke Hulst (46) broaches a sensitive and personal theme: mourning for an unborn child. Near future The Mitsukoshi Troostbaby Company is a novel as only Auke Hulst writes it....
In the second episode of the podcast KunstZINnig, I talk to art curator and writer Hanne Hagenaars about how art gives meaning to her life: 'Art has deepened and, in a way, saved my life'. Hanne Hagenaars wrote the book 'No Cloud: How Art Saved My Life' in 2016. In this book, she discusses artworks that...
Teun Toebes (22) shares kitchen, bathroom and toilet not with fellow students but with people with dementia. He wrote a book about it: VerpleegThuis. The book came in at number 1 in the Bestseller 60 last week, much to his delight, because Toebes wants to reach as many people as possible with his mission: to change care for people with a faltering brain. 'It...
As a physicist, Paolo Giordano was deeply concerned about the development of Covid-19. As a writer, he could interpret those feelings of concern and share them with the public. Giordano's articles are collected in What I Don't Want to Forget. 'It would be a sin if all this suffering and all these deaths were in vain.' Aware of the danger When he...
Friends call him brother. His children say daddy. One day he hopes to become a grandfather. Sam Bettens (49) was known worldwide as the lead singer of Belgian band K's Choice when he decided to transition. And now he walks the beach in swimming trunks: 'I never want to hide myself again.' Tomboy As a young girl, Sam Bettens was a tomboy and wore the...
The theatres are struggling to fill up, technicians have hung up their lamps, but tickets are not on sale for Het Nationale Theater's Trojan Wars. So in this long-awaited Nerd podcast (the AVROTROS thinks the tune is really terrible), we talk to Cees Debets, the director of that great theatre company from The Hague. Marijn Lems also happens to have a few...
'Every time I go to a beach, I see the sea through a filter of all the texts written about the sea.' Writer Joachim Robbrecht, at the request of Romain Bisschoff and together with writer brother Artun Alaska Arasli, created a sound poem for Ensemble Silbersee. During November Music, the work will finally premiere, after it had been a year...
Jan-Peter de Graaff (b. 1992) is and thinks big. As an islander, raised on Terschelling as a child of musicians, he also perhaps perceives things a little differently from the peripheral city. The height of the sky, the nothingness of a strip of land surrounded by the movement and power of water; they suggest infinity and the mystery of higher powers. That perspective...
Back Home, the new novel by Spanish writer Jesús Carrasco (49) is not only a portrait of a family and two generations, but also a portrait of Spain itself. 'Today's literature gives social groups a voice they didn't have before.' Three years of work and two complete novels ended up in the dustbin before Jesús Carrasco wrote his new novel Back...
Even though the satirical programme Jiskefet has not existed for more than 15 years, Michiel Romeyn (66) is still recognised on the street as 'lullo' Van Binsbergen, 'the white nigger' Oboema or office clerk Storm. In Romeyn's existence, the dividing line between life and theatre is fluid. 'I like to disrupt things,' he says. 'We're hopefully not going to talk about Jiskefet after all....
Producer Pieter van Huystee resumes working with Heddy Honigmann, one of the Netherlands' leading documentary filmmakers. In her latest film No Hay Camino (There is no road), she looks back on her work and life. Interview with Van Huystee, on the road he travelled with her over 25 years.
Secrets is the title of Italian writer Domenico Starnone's (78) latest novel. But actually, as far as he is concerned, the secret is not what the story is about. 'It is about the fear we feel for the other, because the other always remains, under whatever circumstances, the ánder.' Human behaviour Domenico Starnone's finely crafted, concise novels...
If either parent is not firmly on their feet, how does that affect an entire family? That is what Een goede moeder (A good mother), the new novel by Jan van Mersbergen (50), is about. The story is based on the past years of his own life. 'It wasn't supposed to be a reckoning.' Adventure novel Two years ago, he said that at 50, when he was...
'As for many people, the theatre festival really does mean something. Like the Fringe, it is impossible to imagine without it. I've been able to make artistic friendships there, I've been able to have arguments there, I've met people who I thought were adversaries who turned out to be comrades-in-arms. Because there are not only performances, there is...
'We thought it would be a good idea, after a year and a half of misery, not to start immediately with the most critical perspective, but rather to emphasise how good it was to be together again.' In this podcast, Marijn Lems and Wijbrand Schaap look back with Guy Weizman at his 'State of the Theatre', the traditional opening of the...
Writer and publicist Henk Pröpper had only just moved to his beloved Paris when the city came to a standstill, and so did his heart almost. Once fitted with a pacemaker, he took to the city in the one hour a day Parisians were allowed. A new world opened up for him. For Henk Pröpper (62), former director...
There is a huge amount happening in theatre, this summer, as many summer festivals have special corona editions where they show a lot of what was made in attic rooms last year during the forced closure of theatres. One such show was Die Hexe, by Club Gewalt, a fresh point theatre band/theatre collective that is/was showing at Theatre Festival Boulevard this summer. Nerd...
Guilherme Miotto is artistic director of Corpo Maquina, an extraordinary dance company based in Breda and Tilburg. This year, among other things, he is at Festival Boulevard in Den Bosch with the performance Tak. A performance, stemming from an earlier project in an urban district of Den Bosch. Six women he worked with there now form an ensemble with whom he...
This podcast is recorded in English. For those who do not speak the language, or who do not have time to listen to the full podcast, here are some quotes. 'Originally I didn't have a title. Someone came up with 'Born to' and then I thought it would be nice to put 'manifesto' after it. After all, it is about appearing,...
Naomi Velissariou (1984) was actually supposed to be at the Bossche Festival Boulevard 2021 with more performances. This year, her entire trilogy 'Permanent Destruction' would be performed in a setting like club rave. Fierce musical theatre, based on playwrights Sarah Kane and Heiner Müller, and concluded with the more subdued work 'Pain against Fear'. All parts have received rave reviews from audiences and press, but...
With his opinion piece in the Volkskrant, he drew the ire of gein manufacturers like Bert Brussen and Hans Teeuwen. In no uncertain personal attacks, 'Suck My Dick Zijp' was accused of having a 'gender-neutral rotten head', which showed that 'woke' people had no humour. Reason for the woke nerds, Marijn Lems and I, aka the...
As in the animation sector, the book trade is hugely diverse. Within the Netherlands, around 4,500(!) publishing houses operate. From cooking and baking to self-help, from fact to fiction, an awful lot is written and published in the Netherlands. But there is also a publisher, World Editions, which does operate from the Netherlands, but focuses on the English market. They translate existing...
Girl gangs and sugar dating - these are the themes of Bambi likes you raw. Caroline De Mulder (44) wanted to talk about the violence of women rather than against women. 'I could work out the dark, aggressive sides in myself without bashing someone's head in.' Bambi's protagonist, 16-year-old Hilda, or Bambi, as her...
In 2014, The Cutter published a review of De Wereld Draait Door. What not many people will know is that prior to that moment, there was a weeks-long battle behind the scenes over this publication. De Wereld Draait Door tried with all its might to stop the episode by not giving permission to quote the footage. Initially,...
Public space is dressed up with visualisation, music video and art in many places, including TivoliVredenburg. Either via projection mapping on buildings during events, or via LED panels in shop windows and abris, but also as digital art during performances and lobbies in theatres. In TivoliVredenburg, in the heart of Utrecht, they even create separate events for it. Canvas is a programme that...
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