Hans Lodeizen

Hans Lodeizen (1924–1950) is a peerless figure on the Dutch literary scene. He spent the tiny sliver of an adult life that he got to have in the English-speaking world, working in isolation from his Dutch contemporaries — most of whom he never even met — but he was a significant influence on his own and successive generations of poets.

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Hans Lodeizen

The poetry of Hans Lodeizen

Growing up, Lodeizen was a frail, introverted child whose asthma often kept him home, where he spent much of his time in the garden studying ants. In high school he came out of his shell more, captivating his classmates by reading their palms and predicting all sorts of future fortune and doom. But like many teenagers coming of age during the Second World War, he felt trapped. And he’d realized he was gay at a time when homosexuality was still widely pathologized. He dreamed of a different world where he could truly be himself.

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