Maurits Dekker

Maurits Dekker, completely Maurits Rudolph Joël Dekker (* July 16, 1896 in Amsterdam, † October 7, 1962 ibid ), was a Dutch writer of Jewish origin who wrote primarily socially critical novels and dramas. Successful abroad was his piece The world has no waiting room of 1949, which has the nuclear threat to the background. During the German occupation Dekker was active in the anti-fascist resistance.

Life and work

Dekker grew up in the Jewish proletarian milieu Amsterdam. After elementary school, was given by the son of a house painter and seller and a nurse with occasional work on water. The realm of literature, he discovered in a union library. In November 1921, he came to a robbery and murder in jail on suspicion of complicity, but was left in the following March for lack of evidence again. These adhesion experience went immediately into Dekker's first novel Doodenstadt that appeared previously in the newspaper Het Volk. The main theme of his early works is " Crime and Punishment". Despite melodramatic trains and too intrusive social agitation she certainly showed Dekkers talent, but did not get any or unfavorable reviews. Autodidact Dekker kept the reviewers for biased - 1929 he was therefore his novel Waarom ik niet krankzinnig ben (Why I'm not crazy ) when Russian translation from author Boris Robazki. This work earned some praise, although or because it smells like Dostoyevsky. Then Dekker revealed the coup - and continued his career under considerably greater attention continues.

Insulting a head of state

Taking up the contrasting reportage and mounting style of New Objectivity, Dekker was gradually own stylistic and formal solutions. However, he suffered incessantly to financial hardship. He wrote for the magazine De Vrije Bladen ( The vain sheet ) and De Stem ( The Voice ) and contributed 1932/33, together with Jacques Gans, Jef Last, Nico Rost, Frans Goedhart the group to the new journal Left Align (left flashing). However, he soon had to admit, for collective projects, including parties to be reclusive. The Communist Party, he was anyway to " petty-bourgeois ", ie anarchist. In 1937 he brought out a pamphlet against Hitler, which he had to pay for the following year with a fine of 100 guilders because he had disparaged a foreign head of state. He was lucky: The amount was paid by U.S. citizens Hendrik Willem van Loon. Dekker traveled promptly to the U.S., agreed to forgo an exile because he did not want to let down his wife Maria Engelina Hellingman, with whom he had been married since 1923, and their two daughters. Shortly before the German invasion he completed Pius, a book about the "human despair ", which is one of the most compelling works Lammers Dekkers.

Warm raisin bread

As a Jew and endangered agitator thought it Dekker during the occupation is opportune to submerge; his books were banned. Later he worked in a factory. With the support of his wife, he helped Jews to food ration cards, identity papers or hiding. These hard time reflected in the novel De laars op de nek ( The inverted boat) down from 1945, the " like warm raisin bread " went away, according to Dekkers epistolary communication to an American friend, despite the shattered state of the country. A further boost gave him the great success of his (more frequently translated ) piece De wereld heeft geen watches kamer ( The world has no waiting room ), which was premiered in October 1949 in Amsterdam. It is about the gap between the technical and moral faculties of humanity on the example of atomic danger. A particularly influential admirers and supporters had Dekker in Victor Vriesland. Now he had first significant revenue as a writer, but soon fell ill his wife hard ( and correspondingly expensive ), and died 1954. The following year, the widower married Hendrika Christina van Assen. He himself increasingly plagued by rheumatic pains, which also aggravated his writing. Dekker died in 1962 at the age of 66 years. With 23 volumes of prose and eight dramas he leaves behind a fairly extensive body of work, but showing considerable differences in quality.

Awards

Works

• Doodenstadt, novel, 1923 ( Prison Life )
• Homo Cantat, " Lyrical prose poem " (A. Lammers ), 1924
• C. R. 133, novel, 1926
• Zijn Wereld, novel, 1928
• Waarom ik niet krankzinnig ben, novel, 1929, under the pseudonym Boris Robazki
• De aarde splijt, novel, 1930
• Amsterdam, novel, 1931
• De man een the other thing, novel, 1931
• Brood ( bread), novel, 1932
• Reflex, novel, 1932
• Roodboek, 1933
• De laatste minuut, Drama, 1933
• Aan both edges van de jamb, novel, 1934
• De people Meenen het goed met de people, novel, 1934
• Oranje, trilogy, 1935-38 ( historical )
• Willem van Oranje, Drama, 1937
• Inc. Pius beveelt, novel, 1939
• Mordje de Jood, novel, 1939
• De laars op de nek, novel, 1945 ( occupation )
• Jozef duikt, novel, 1946, German Josef submerges, Munich 1948
• Afscheid, 1946
• Vonnis voltrokken, Drama, 1946
• De knopenman, short stories, 1947 German The button man Bremen 1957
• Panopticum, Drama, 1947
• Het merkteken, 1948
• Amsterdam bij gaslight, novel, 1949
• De wereld heeft geen watches kamer, Drama, UA 1949 German The world has no waiting room, translated by Walter P. Jacob, Leipzig 1953
• De tooverdoos, 1950
• De other wet, Drama, 1952
• X.O.X., Drama, 1952
• De afgrond is vlak voor uw voeken, novel, 1952 ( The abyss lies at your feet, anti-Bolshevik )
• Voor like zich zingt, Drama, 1953
• Stramien op zwart, short stories, 1956
• Het others, 1957
• Poe! Poe! , German pussy! Pussy! A book for true cat lovers, Zurich 1961

Dekker also written several radio plays