| Hugo Maurice Julien Claus | |||||
閱讀雨果·剋勞斯 Hugo Claus在诗海的作品!!! | |||||
比利時詩人，小說傢，劇作傢，畫傢，翻譯傢，劇場監督兼製片，曾獲多項文學奬，近年來屢次列名諾貝爾奬候選名單，為當今荷蘭語文壇最多才多藝、最多産的作傢之一。Hugo Claus was considered to be one of the most important contemporary Dutch language authors. Under the pseudonym Dorothea van Male, he published the novel Schola Nostra (1971). He also used the pseudonyms Jan Hyoens and Thea Streiner. In 1983, he published Het verdriet van België ("The Sorrow of Belgium"), which is probably his most famous book.
Claus was also a dramatist. He wrote 35 original pieces and 31 translations from English, Greek, Latin, French, Spanish and Dutch plays and novels.
Hugo Claus' name had been put forward many times for the Nobel Prize in Literature, on which he would casually comment that "l'argent de ce prix m'aurait bien arrangé" ("this prize money would suit me fine").
Life
Hugo Claus was born in Bruges. He was the eldest son of the printer Jozef (Joseph) Claus and Germaine Vanderlinden. In February 1931, his brother Guido was born (died November 9 1991). Guido was later followed by two other brothers -- Odo (born January 1934) and Johan (born November 1938).
From February 1953 until the beginning of 1955, Hugo Claus lived in Italy where his girlfriend Elly Overzier (born in 1928) acted in a few films. They were married on May 26, 1955, and had a son, Thomas, on October 6, 1963. In the early 1970s, he had an affair with actress Sylvia Kristel, who was 27 years younger, with whom he had a son Arthur born in 1975. The relationship ended in 1977, when she left him for actor Ian McShane.
He was a "contrarian", of "anarchist spirit". Journalist Guy Duplat recalls that Claus had organized in Knokke the election of a "Miss Knokke Festival", which was a standard Beauty contest, except for the Claus ruling that the members of the all-male jury would have to be naked.
Claus was actively opposed to Flemish separatism.
Death
Claus suffered from Alzheimer's disease and requested his life to be terminated through euthanasia at the Middelheim Ziekenhuis in Antwerp on March 19, 2008. Euthanasia is legal in Belgium.
The Belgian Minister of Culture stated, "I knew him well enough to know that he wanted to depart with pride and dignity". Former Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt said that he imagined the onset of Alzheimer's must have been "inevitable and unbearable torture". "I can live with the fact that he decided thus", he said, "because he left us as a great glowing star, right on time, just before he would have collapsed into a black hole".
His death by euthanasia has received criticism from the Roman Catholic Church and the Belgian Alzheimer League. The Belgian Alzheimer League respects Claus' decision, but believes the media coverage of his death neglects other options for Alzheimer patients.
Prizes
(incomplete list)
1952 - Arkprijs van het Vrije Woord for De Metsiers
1964 - August Beernaertprize for De verwondering
1965 - Henriëtte Roland Holst-prize for all his plays
1967 - Edmond Hustinxprize for all his plays
1979 - Constantijn Huygensprize
1985 - Cestoda-prize
1986 - Herman Gorterprize for Alibi
1986 - Prijs der Nederlandse Letteren
1994 - Prijs voor Meesterschap
1994 - VSB Poëzieprize for De Sporen
1997 - Libris Literatuurprize for De Geruchten
1998 - Aristeion Prize for De Geruchten
2000 - Premio Nonino
Bibliography
Claus wrote over a thousand pages of poetry, more than sixty plays, over twenty novels and several essays, film scripts, libretti and translations. Only a small part of this œuvre has been translated into English:
Prose:
The Duck Hunt, 1955 (De Metsiers, 1950)
Sister of Earth, 1966 (De Metsiers, 1950)
The Sorrow of Belgium, 1990 (Het verdriet van België, 1983) (ISBN 1-58567-238-6)
The Swordfish, 1996 (De Zwaardvis, 1989) (ISBN 0-7206-0985-2)
Desire, 1997 (Het verlangen, 1978) (ISBN 0-14-025538-9)
Poetry:
with Karel Appel: Love Song, 1963 (written in English)
Four Flemish Poets: Hugo Claus, Gust Gils, Paul Snoek, Hugues C. Pernath / edited by Peter Nijmeijer. (1976) (ISBN 0856820342)
with Pierre Alechinsky and Karel Appel: Two-brush paintings: Their poems by Hugo Claus, 1980 (Zwart, 1978)
An Evening of postwar poetry of The Netherlands and Flanders [sound recording]: Hugo Claus, Judith Herzberg, Gerrit Kouwenaar, and Cees Nooteboom reading their poems, 1984
__Select__ed Poems 1953-1973, 1986
The Sign of the Hamster, 1986 (Het teken van de Hamster, 1964) (ISBN 9071345130)
Greetings: __select__ed poems, 2004 (ISBN 0151009007)
Theatre:
Friday, 1972 (Vrijdag, 1969) (ISBN 0706700511)
Four Works for the Theatre, 1990 (ISBN 0-9666152-1-2)
Friday, 1993 (Vrijdag, 1969)
The sacrament and other plays of forbidden love, 2007 (ISBN 9781575911106)
Essay:
Karel Appel, Painter, 1962 (Karel Appel, Schilder, 1964)
References
^ Radio-Television Belge RTBF (French)
^ Le Devoir (French)
^ La Croix (French)
^ a b Revue de la presse belge (French)
^ a b BBC obituary, 2008
^ ArtAndYou, 2008
^ De Standaard online (Dutch)
^ LCI (French)
^ (Dutch). The Roman Catholic Church criticized the media coverage; cardinal Godfried Danneels referred to Claus' euthanasia in his Easter Homily.