The whole sadness of Belgium (Het verdriet van België) - a novel by Hug Claus from 1983 written in Dutch. It was published in Polish in 1994, unfortunately with a vulgar cover. Also in 1994 a miniseries was created based on it.
This is a bildungsroman consisting of two parts:
The main character is the author's alter ego. It presents his childhood and youth in the Flemish village of Walle (part of the city of Kortrijk) in the years 1939 - 1947.
Probably the most important novel depicting collaboration with Germany in the occupied country. Story
Belgium, 1939. Ten-year-old Louis Seynaeve is learning at a boarding school run by nuns in Haarbeke, a fictional town near Kortrijk. He has different fantasies. They call themselves "four apostles" with their friends and have seven forbidden books. A father arrives and tells him that his mother has fallen down the stairs, which in fact means she is pregnant. A few months later, the baby is born dead.
The boy's family members are Flemish nationalists. Louis' father buys a printing press in Germany and a Hitlerjugend doll. During the German occupation, the family sympathizes with Germany. Louis attends Hitlerjugend during his stay abroad in Mecklenburg.
Louis discovers further "banned books" and becomes interested in "degenerated art". He understands more and more the mental tightness of his family and his education. He eventually becomes a writer. He is the author of "Smutku", the first part of the novel. Main characters
wiki
Comments
Post a Comment