E. Du Perron

Biography

Edgar du Perron (1899-1940) spent his youth in Java and much of his adulthood in Europe. He was the co-founder of Forum magazine, which was dedicated to replacing the superficial elegance of literary style with the greater sincerity of literary content. Du Perron longed for independence of judgment and personality. He criticized mediocrity, imitation and literary bombast, and he opposed political coercion and other limits to freedom. He died in the Netherlands in 1940 on the day the Dutch army surrendered to the German invaders.

Titles

Country of origin

(Het land van herkomst, 1935)

Eddy du Perron - usually shortened to E. du Perron - along with his friend Menno ter Braak, gave colour, taste and direction to the literary climate of the Netherlands of the thirties. In their essays, talks and polemics, and as editors of the famous magazine Forum, Ter Braak and Du Perron passionately defended ‘the ordinary guy’ in literature. They believed that it wasn’t the form or the style that was decisive for the quality of prose or poetry, but the ‘personality’ of the writer as it emerged in the work. Continued...