't Hart, Maarten "The raging of the whole world"

't Hart, Maarten "The fury/rage/raging of the whole world" (Dutch: Het woeden der gehele wereld) - 1993

The title translates as "The fury/rage/raging of the whole world" and is derived from the text of the poem "Au bord de l'eau" by Sully Prudhomme, set to music by Gabriel Fauré.

I don't often review books that have not been translated into English. Why this one wasn't? I have no idea! But I read it as part of the Xanadu Reading Challenge 2021: a book in a language with which you are familiar, but don’t read in very often, if at all. I dug through my TBR pile for Dutch books and there was this one, presenting itself: Read Me, Read Me, Read Me! So I did.

This is a very well written novel with a lot of humour in it but also a lot of understanding for the people of the time, the people that were hunted by the Nazis (including a lot of Dutch people who stood by) as well as those that were "on the wrong side" or just "wrong", as he calls them or as they are called in the Netherlands. Whilst the story doesn't take place during WWII, the events in this novel are sequences thereof. As a lot of the stories of the second half of the last century are. Especially the Dutch ones.

Alexander, the protagonist, tells his life story from the perspective of a 50-year-old. He tells about his youth in a small town as the son of a rag dealer whose main goal in life was saving. His big love is music and he manages, despite many obstacles, to make it his profession. When he is twelve, he witnesses a murder and the fear to be killed by the same person accompanies him for the rest of his life. Of course, he tries to find out who is behind all this and that's what this book is about, mainly. But it also is about music and life in a small town and growing up and and and.

I was more than positively surprised about this book because I read another book by the same author (The Sundial) and was totally bored. That's probably the reason I had this one on my TBR pile for so long because I didn't fancy reading another novel by the same author. My, was I wrong!

From the back cover (translated from Dutch):

"Het woeden der gehele wereld/The Rage of the Whole World focuses on the eventful youth of Alexander Goudveyl. The history of Alexander's youth in the fifties and sixties is also the history of a murder case that has never been resolved: in 1956, just before Christmas in Maassluis, a police officer was shot dead in broad daylight.

Het woeden der gehele wereld/The Rage of the Whole World is an exciting novel that grips the reader until the last page. An international bestseller that was awarded the Gouden Strop in 1994."

The Gouden Strop (i.e. 'Golden Noose') is a Dutch prize for the best crime novel, awarded annually.