Willem Bilderdijk, 1756-1831 (English)

Willem Bilderdijk is without a doubt one of the most colourful figures in Dutch literature. Apart from a small circle of enthusiasts, however, few people read his work. While he may not be a Goethe, he was regarded as a giant among dwarfs in our language area in the first half of the nineteenth century, despite his eccentric and contrarian personality. Yet Bilderdijk was not only a remarkable poet; he was also an extremely prolific translator. His translations, which make up an organic part of his work, have not yet been studied in the context of his oeuvre as a whole. This is a shame, not only because many of them are very special texts, but also because regardless of how idiosyncratic his translations are, Bilderdijk is in many ways typical of his time. He translated Sophocles, Ovid, and Horace, among others.

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