De Arbeiderspers
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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De Arbeiderspers is a Dutch publishing company, started as a socialist enterprise. The name means 'The Workers' Press'. The company was started in 1929 as a combination of the publishing firm N.V. Ontwikkeling and the Dutch Social Democratic Workers' Party newspaper Het Volk. Currently it is part of a larger media conglomerate, the Weekbladpersgroep, which also includes publishing companies De Bezige Bij and Querido.
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Company management and politics
Until well into the 1960s, the press was known as a "socialist bastion," and until Martin Ros joined in 1964, literature was regarded with suspicion—the press published regional novels by authors such as Herman de Man and A.M. de Jong. Martin Ros, a well-read and well-spoken man, was hired specifically to "stir the pot," and one of his first acquisitions was Gerrit Komrij, at the time a young poet with formalist, not socialist, tendencies. Ros is also responsible, with then-director Johan Veeninga, for the Privé-domein series. Theo Sontrop joined the company in 1972.
Until 1991, Sontrop was the managing director. Ronald Dietz succeeded him, and during his tenure the press lost some of its high-profile writers (Jeroen Brouwers, Kristien Hemmerechts, and others). Martin Ros resigned in 1997. When in 2000 Gerrit Komrij, one of the best-known Dutch writers, came under contract with De Bezige Bij, pressure on Dietz increased and he resigned his position. Rob Haans became interim director.
Privé-domein
One of the Arbeiderspers's most successful series is Privé-domein ("private domain"), containing memoirs and autobiographies. The series was inspired by a similar series of ego documents by Editions du Cap, called Domaine privé, whose title was borrowed as well. The first volumes (containing a memoir by Mary McCarthy and a volume of titillating diary entries by Paul Léautaud) were published in 1966, and in forty-five years almost three hundred books appeared in the series. The "golden years" of the series were the 1980s, when its editors were Martin Ros, Theo Sontrop, and Emile Brugman.
Nederlandstalige auteurs
Nederlandstalige auteurs uitgegeven door De Arbeiderspers: Simon Carmiggelt, Cees Nooteboom, Louis Paul Boon, Annie M.G. Schmidt, Gerrit Komrij, Jeroen Brouwers, Boudewijn Büch, Maarten 't Hart, Marijke Höweler, Tessa de Loo, Marion Bloem, Joost Zwagerman, Astrid Roemer.
Succesvolle nieuwe auteurs van de laatste jaren: Anna Enquist, Arthur Japin, Pauline Slot en Liesbeth Mende.
Anderstalige auteurs
Daarnaast heeft de uitgeverij vele belangrijke anderstalige schrijvers uitgegeven. Bijvoorbeeld: Irvine Welsh, Paulo Coelho, Louis de Bernières, Michel Houellebecq, Paul Auster, John Updike, Cormac McCarthy, Orhan Pamuk, Robert Menasse, Alan Warner, Ernst Jünger, Thomas Mann, Friedrich Nietzsche, Fernando Pessoa, Georges Perec, Konstantin Paustovskij, Jean Dutourd, August Strindberg.
