David Van Reybrouck
David Van Reybrouck | |
|---|---|
 David Van Reybrouck. | |
| Born | 11 September 1971 |
| Occupation | Author |
David Grégoire Van Reybrouck (born 11 September 1971, in Bruges) is a Belgian cultural historian, archaeologist and author. He writes historical fiction, literary non-fiction, novels, poetry, plays and academic texts. He has received several Dutch literary prizes, including AKO Literature Prize (2010) and Libris History Prize.
Background and education
Van Reybrouck was born into a family of florists, bookbinders and artists. His father, a farmer's son, spent five years in the Democratic Republic of the Congo as a railway engineer immediately after independence. He holds a doctorate from Leiden University.
Writings
Van Reybrouck's first book, De Plaag (in English: The Plague), was a cross between a travelogue and a literary whodunnit set in post-apartheid South Africa. It received several awards, including the prize for the best Flemish debut in 2002 and a shortlist nomination for the Gouden Uil, one of the leading literary prizes in the Low Countries. It was translated into Afrikaans, French and Hungarian. A longtime op-ed writer for the Flemish national newspaper De Morgen, Van Reybrouck has co-edited a volume on the federal future of Belgium (What Belgium Stands For: a Scenario, 2007) and a thought-provoking pamphlet, Pleidooi voor populisme (A Plea for Populism, 2008), which was met with controversy. The latter won the Netherlands' most distinguished essay prize.
His book Congo. Een geschiedenis (in English: Congo: The Epic History of a People) was published in 2010. Over the years, Van Reybrouck has travelled extensively throughout Africa. The book is as much the result of his ten journeys through the Democratic Republic of the Congo as of the months spent in libraries and archives. He has interviewed hundreds of individuals, with a particular predilection for so-called "ordinary people", precisely because their lives and choices are so often extraordinary. The book portrays slavery and colonialism, resistance and survival. It includes archival material, interviews and personal observations. Congo. Een geschiedenis has been translated into English, French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Swedish, Danish and Finnish. Van Reybrouck has also been actively involved in organising literary workshops for Congolese playwrights in Kinshasa and Goma.
In 2020 he published Revolusi which applies to Indonesia the method he used in Congo - a combination of interviews with Indonesian Nationalists and genocide perpetrators that live in complete impunity. Discussing the events that lead to start of Indonesia's military dictatorship, with historical interpretation.
In his book Against Elections: The Case for Democracy he advocates for a deliberative democracy based on sortition.
Awards and honors
- 2004, Taalunie Toneelschrijfprijs
- 2007, Royal Academy of Dutch language and literature
- 2008, Ark Prize of the Free Word, Missie (play)
- 2010, AKO Literature Prize, Congo
- 2012, Prix Médicis essai, Congo
- 2014, Gouden Ganzenveer[1]
- 2015, Doctor Honoris Causa of Saint-Louis University, Brussels[2]
- 2017, European Book Prize, fiction for Zink. Although a work of non-fiction, it won the fiction category.[3]
- 2018, European Press Prize, nominated with "Should media report differently in the wake of attacks? Think about it and join the discussion!"[4]
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Publications (English)
- 2000, From Primitives to Primates. A history of ethnographic and primatological analogies in the study of prehistory. Leiden, Sidestone Press, 2012. (Dissertation Leiden University, 2000). ISBN 978-90-8890-095-2
- 2008, Missie (play)
- 2014, Congo: The Epic History of a People. Transl. by Sam Garrett. HarperCollins, 2014. ISBN 9780062200112
- 2015, The First World War Now ISBN 978-9492081070
- 2016, Against Elections: The Case for Democracy, ISBN 978-1847924223
Publication (Dutch)
- 2016, essay "Zink" about Neutral Moresnet.
- 2020, Revolusi - Indonesië en het ontstaan van de moderne wereld, De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 2020, ISBN 9789403183404
References
- ^ Gouden Ganzenveer 2014
- ^ "Séance inaugurale de rentrée académique 2015–2016". Université Saint-Louis – Bruxelles.
- ^ "David Van Reybrouck wins the European Book Prize". Focus on Belgium. 14 December 2017. Retrieved 24 December 2017.
- ^ "Should media report differently in the wake of attacks? Think about it and join the discussion!".
This article is wholly or partly based on material from Dutch Wikipedia
