Stefan Hertmans is professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent. He is considered one of the leading Dutch-language writers and poets of the present. He has published novels, collections of short stories, essays on literature and philosophy, theatre texts, and poetry. His work is widely translated, amongst others in England, France, Germany and Spain.
Hertmans has won several major literary prizes, such as the Flemish Culture Prize for Poetry for Muziek voor de overtocht (Music for the Crossing, 1994), a collection of five long poems on Paul Hindemith, Paul Valéry, Paul Cézanne, Vaslav Nijinsky and Wallace Stevens. The same collection was nominated the VSB poetry prize. The collection Goya als Hond (Goya as a dog, 1999) was acclaimed a true summit in his work and in Dutch and Flemish poetry of today. One of the poems won the prize for the best poem of 1999. In 2006 Hertmans published Muziek voor de overtocht. Gedichten 1975-2005 (Music for the crossing. Poems 1975-2005), a revised republication of all his poetry volumes.
Selective bibliography Poetry
Muziek voor de overtocht (Music for the Crossing), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1994
Francesco’s paradox, Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1995
Annunciaties (Annunciations), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1997
Goya als hond (Goya as a dog), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1999
Kaneelvingers (Cinnamon Fingers), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 2005
Muziek voor de overtocht. Gedichten 1975-2005 (Music for the crossing. Poems 1975-2005), De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam, 2006
Fiction & Essays
Naar Merelbeke (To Merelbeke), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1994
Fuga’s en pimpelmezen (Fugues and blue tits), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1995
Steden (Intercities), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1998
Als op de eerste dag (As on the first day), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 2001
Harder dan sneeuw (Harder than snow), Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 2004
Het zwijgen van de tragedie (The silence of tragedy), De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam, 2007
Het verborgen weefsel (Hidden Fibre), De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam, 2008
Translations of poetry
English translations in Modern Poetry in translation, 1997
Francesco’s paradox (English), Limelight, Kortrijk, 1999
Scardanelli - gedichte (German), Athena, Oberhausen, 2001
Goya como perro (Spanish), Het beschrijf, Brussel, 2001
Antologia de poemas (Spanish), Calima Ediciones, Palma de Mallorca, 2002
Selected poems (Georgian), Link, Tbilisi, 2003
Le Paradoxe de Fransesco – poèmes (French), Le Castor Astral, Paris-Bordeaux, 2004
Selection of poems (German), in Keine triste Isolde, Gegenwartslyrik aus Flandern und den Niederlanden, Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen, 2007
Literary Prizes for his poetry work
Arkprijs van het Vrije Woord (1988)
Interprovincial Prize for Literature(1989)
Prize of the Flemish Guide (1992)
Flemish Culture Prize for Poetry (1995)
The Paull Snoek-prize (1996)
Award for the best poem of the year (1999)
The Maurice Gilliamsprize (2002)
Links
The poet’s home page (in Dutch, English, French and Spanish).
The works of Stefan Hertmans are published by De Bezige Bij (in Dutch).
Stefan Hertmans on Lyrikline.
