Flanders Literature helps publishers and festival organisers find that one particular title or author that is the perfect fit for their list or audience. So take a good look around, we present a selection of the finest literature from Flanders. If you like what you see, please get in touch with us for further information.
Van hee holds on to the ordinary, familiar, everyday things: landscapes, conversations, relationships and moments of intense love. The seeming transparency of her language gives a universal dimension to our everyday images of loss. The reader imagines himself safe in her world, an illusion that is often suddenly dashed.
His poems seem so easy and so obvious, but their core is the sense of being alone in a silent world
Hugo Brems
A constant in Herman de Coninck's poems is the urge to bring poetry closer to everyday reality without adopting the pose of a distant observer. In his poems, he often takes a familiar situation as the point of departure, things like an autumn walk or a birthday party. He is a poet of understatement, who counters sentimentality with ironic humour.
The great charm of this book lies in its explosive mix of opinion and storytelling.
El Pais
The result is a beautiful balance between intellectual understanding and personal impressions. His great strength is his ability to keep his eyes open in all circumstances and to surprise himself with the realization that ‘travelling often turns out to be a process of finding what you weren’t looking for’.
Hard, pleasantly crude and more topical than ever. His stories are on fast forward without the brakes on.
De Standaard over 'Web'
Mennes depicts young characters who resort to extreme measures in an attempt to deal with the emptiness of their lives. ‘Toast’ offers a heart-wrenching and impressive portrait of a Lost Generation.
Three Sisters in London will one day form the exquisite prologue to the inevitable Collected Works of Eric de Kuyper.
De Stem
During World War I, Eric de Kuyper’s grandfather’s position with the railways took him and his family to London. The family’s three daughters, who were then in their adolescence, never returned to London. They gave this gleaming period of their lives a special place in the stories they often told on family occasions. De Kuyper, who was born during World War II, has collected these stories in a captivating book.
'High Key' is a postmodern novel, a collection of text types: monologues, dances and stories. Hoste tries to create a new reality via the imagination and techniques of association. It can be read as an incantation or a magic spell.
She is the only philosopher writing in Dutch who can make philosophy not just nonacademic and understandable but moving.
Herman De Coninck
The great value of Patricia De Martelaere's essays ultimately lies in what makes them rise above philosophical debate. Whereas philosophers like to make readers furrow their brows as deeply as possible, the author excels at laying out a clear line of argument, avoiding jargon and applying convincing logic.
Geert De Kockere’s poetic language and Lieve Baeten’s gorgeous illustrations lift this book above the average, as does its content: together with Elly Dark Blue, readers learn that there is more beyond a monochromatic world.
Love and what follows is the theme of this collection of ten stories: about the catastrophe ánd the tenderness of sex, about habit, love-hate, memory, selfpity, rollicking revenge.
‘The Charred Alphabet’ follows the life of the author from October 1990 to September 1991. This literary diary is a colourful mixture of stories, impressions of and reflections on literature, art, love, nature, politics and growing old.
Complete hopelessness without slipping into pathos or protective irony
Ons Erfdeel
In this collection of stories Berckmans shows the most unsavoury and corrupt side of reality. The unstable characters bear their existential emptiness without illusions, self-deceiving optimism is alien to them. Every sentence of Berckmans is filled with the buzz of rock ‘n roll.
A moving book with a rich and functional recounting of anecdotes
Het Parool
‘White is Always Nice’ is a moving story about origins, mourning and language. It is the extended monologue of an old woman who has just died but cannot stop talking. In a one-sided conversation with her silent son, she keeps up her usual non-stop chatter as her body is laid out and preparations are made for the wake.
‘Aunt Jeannot’s Hat' is set in a suburb of the city shortly after the Second World War. The air is alive with the excitement of newfound freedom and life has taken its leave of traditional conventions. The magnificent and the mundane aspects of a young boy’s life are beautifully depicted in many small details.
Claus reveals his mastery by producing a sentimental story about a total failure
De Morgen
In ‘A Tender Destruction’ Claus uses a number of tried and trusted themes. However, he tells the tale of this tragic love affair masterfully, without ever becoming depressing.
Within the space of three days, six people are murdered. All the evidence leads to Angelo Ledda, a ruthless hitman who suffers from progressive memory loss. A well-researched crime novel by the 'Godfather of the Flemish thriller'.
‘The Man Who Found a Job’ is a milestone in Brusselmans' extensive oeuvre, serving as unique point of reference for one of Flanders’ most read authors. The combination of desperation and emptiness and the sardonic indulgence of this general malaise in the innocent, unsuspecting citizen caused a major stir in the traditional Flemish literature of the 1980s.
Moving, interesting and a literary jewel in terms of its form
Vrij Nederland
‘Letter to Boudewijn’ is a lesson in social history, a meticulous description of village life, and an autobiography all in one. It is a book in which the author confronts himself with his origins, with the shift from material to spiritual poverty, and with sorrow at the loss of solid ground in a group of people who stick together.
In ‘Writing Prague’ Daniël Robberechts tries to create a written portrait of this turbulent city during the end of the 1960s and the decade that followed it. As it goes on, the web becomes increasingly tangled, and ‘Writing Prague’ turns into a book about writing a book, begging the question: is ‘writing’ Prague even possible anymore?
Each poem attests to a supreme form of living – even in failure
Tom Van Inschoot
Acutely aware of the destructive power of time, Bontridder does not set an ethical or aesthetic example to his audience. Rather, he holds a broken mirror up to them, creating a reflection in which the poet and reader rebel against their powerlessness.
Great because of its simplicity and its instantly gripping truthfulness
Gazet van Antwerpen
A monumental book and true Flemish classic. It is a spectacular expression of Boon’s compassion for the committed individual who, despite all adversity, wants to keep on believing in socialist ideals.
With frightening precision, 'The Year of Cancer' sums up just how ugly love can be
De Morgen
Pierre, a suave young man from the insurance and banking world falls for Toni, a simple and somewhat unstable beautician working in show business. The couple gradually drift apart, until the inevitable break-up follows. Pierre continues to read Toni’s horoscope, Cancer. A couple of years later, he is called to her sickbed.
'Arriving In Avignon’ is its own strange and gorgeously sprightly thing. Here’s hoping that as many readers as possible will discover it.
Rain Taxi Review of Books
What at first resembles a cross between a memoir and a guidebook in time proves to be the story of a young man's dogged yet futile quest to know his own mind – unless it is the ancient city of Avignon itself that is our real protagonist: a mystery that can be approached, but never wholly solved. The narrative unfolds in a stream of consciousness, drawing the reader into the protagonist’s quest for experience.
Distinctly innovating poetry resulting in a whirling reading experience
Literaire Canon
Using old myths of fertility described by Frazer, biblical and Christian references and literary quotations, Claus evokes a mythical and fatal family constellation in which the mother, the father, the son and the beloved play roles that are alternately driven by desire and love, but also by fear and hatred. Definitely one of the highpoints in his oeuvre.
One of the purest realisations of the therapeutic novel
Bernard Kemp
One day while looking in a mirror Henri sees deterioration in a body that is no longer his. He undergoes a beauty treatment before entering into the ultimate confrontation with himself, arising from the ashes as a handsome young man. But this ‘purification’ is a vain attempt at camouflaging a life built on lies and deceit.
A fast-paced and nuanced story, a strong indictment of the exploitation of the child
NBD Biblion
A young girl from a working-class family gets up early for her first day at the brickworks. This first day at work means both the end of her childhood years and her ‘initiation’ into adult life. She makes her first acquaintance with the gruelling work, the brutality of the workers and the tyranny of Krevelt, the dreaded boss. She can see only one way out: the young love that blossoms between her and an apprentice. But will that be enough of an anchor to keep her from drifting into the danger that fate is mercilessly pushing her towards?
‘The Battle with the Angel’ tells of the life of a community, spread over several generations, but primarily between the world wars. The work bears witness to an unbridled creative force masterfully endeavouring to portray the contrast between primeval nature and decadence. Teirlinck never moralises or lectures, but is majestic and full of compassion for his characters.
‘Lament for Agnes’ is essentially an autobiographical novel. The character of Agnes is in many respects that of Gijsen’s own fiancé who died of TB, while the narrator has much in common with the authors as a young man. ‘Lament for Agnes’ is a novel that is once deeply personal and a fully independent work of art.
'The Duck Hunt' is the story of a Flemish farming family during World War II. The centre of the family is the widow Metsiers, who is called ‘the Mother’. Years ago, she murdered her husband, together with her lover Mon Verkindere, with whom she now lives on the farmstead. She has two children: Ana and Bennie. Bennie and his half-sister are driven ever closer together, until a love grows between them for which Bennie eventually has to pay the price.
At the end of his life and in the first two decades of the 20th century, Gezelle was hailed by the avant-garde as the founder of modern Flemish poetry, and his unique voice was also belatedly recognised in the Netherlands and often compared with his English contemporary Gerard Manley Hopkins.
A literary all-rounder who explores all facets of life
De Volkskrant
‘Pitfalls’ is a varied collection of letters, verse and short stories. The excerpts from the letters – which were never intended to be made public – caused a furore at the time. The title refers to the obstacles between Minne and the process of writing, between the author and publication – in other words, to the aforementioned struggle. As Minne put it: ‘Caution, enter at your peril!’
A wonderful book, in my opinion. All real people, larger than life.
Willem Elsschot
‘The Aunts’ is a classic novel about the tragedy of a petit-bourgeois family in the early 20th century. This literary tale is, above all, an indictment against the oppressive class-ridden society of the time, but the melodramatic highpoints and the cynical tone will effortlessly fascinate today’s reader.
Maybe it’s the finest thing by Van de Woestijne that we have
Martinus Nijhoff
Evening falls, it grows dark, the peasant Nand is lying alone in bed and is cold. Scraps of his life flash by his mind’s eye. ‘The Dying Peasant’ isn’t just an anecdotal peasant novella, but a symbolic tale that excels in its simplicity.
In ‘The Van Paemel Family’, Cyriel Buysse addresses the social exploitation and immense poverty of the rural population. Buysse paints a picture of how the farmer becomes ruined and his family falls apart as a result of socioeconomic conditions. Although Buysse offers no solutions to the conflict, there is still a glimmer of hope.
