Rebekka de Wit and Jonathan Reeder

Nottingham, 23 November 2016

Rebekka de Wit is a Dutch writer and theatre director. Her 2011 graduation presentation at the Royal Conservatory in Antwerp, Hoe dit het verhaal werd (How this became the story), was awarded a prize at the Theater Aan Zee Festival in Ostend. Her theatre production Stel je voor, ik zoek een staat [Searching for a state] was awarded the 2011. SABAM Schrijfprijs. In 2012 The Flemish-Dutch house deBuren commissioned de Wit for their citybook project which produced the texts As Venice is Now, the Venice-monologue Ik weet er te weinig van [I know too little about it] and, in 2015, a citybook about Antwerp,‘Tot het verschil over sterrenstelsels gaat’ [Until the difference is between galaxies]. De Wit’s 2015 debut novel We komen nog één wonder tekort [Short of Just One Miracle] is a coming-of-age story that combines, like de Wit’s theatre work, wit and sadness with vulnerable tenderness and razor-sharp observations.

Jonathan Reeder, a native of New York and long-time resident of Amsterdam, is a literary translator and performing musician. Alongside his work as a professional bassoonist, he translates opera libretti and essays on classical music, as well as contemporary Dutch fiction by authors including Conny Braam, Peter Buwalda, Bram Dehouck, Adri van der Heijden and Hanna Bervoets. He has translated and transcribed for Christine Otten’s literary biopic De laatste dichters(2011) / The Last Poets (2016) that engages with music, poetry and the history of the Civil Rights Movement in America. 

This event was sponsored by the Centre for Dutch and Flemish Studies at the University of Sheffield and the Nederlandse Taalunie