Frank Martinus Arion

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Frank Martinus Arion (2005)

Frank Martinus Arion (born December 17, 1936 in Willemstad , Curaçao , † September 28, 2015 there ) was a Dutch writer, poet and linguist. He wrote his work in both Dutch and Papiamentu . His best-known work is the 1973 novel Double Game . He is also known for his research on the origin of Papiamentu and for his use of it as a school language.

biography

Frank Martinus Arion was born in 1936 to Minguel Martinus Arion and his wife Marina Jansen in Bona Vista, a suburb of Willemstad on the island of Curaçao. Shortly after the birth, the family moved to Aruba , where the father had accepted a job with a local oil company. When he was four years old, Arion's mother and younger brother died in an accident, whereupon Frank and his sister were sent back to Curaçao, where they found accommodation with changing relatives. Already in elementary school he showed a talent for writing; in the last year of primary school he won the Neerlandia Prize for the best essay in Dutch. During his school days he began to use the name Frank Efraim Martinus for himself. The background to this was his father's political commitment to the Curaçao National People's Party , which led to the name "Arion" becoming a household name for many of the island's residents. Frank did not want to be associated with his father's political activism, however; he did not use his original surname again until the 1950s for the publication of his first works.

After graduating from school, Arion moved to the European Netherlands in 1955, where he began studying Dutch language and Dutch literature at the University of Leiden . During his time at the university he founded the student community Baranka Antilliana , which saw itself as a “refuge” for students who, like himself, came from the Netherlands Antilles . In addition, he wrote a number of poems during these years, which were first published in 1957 as a collection under the title Stemmen uit Afrika (in German "Voices from Africa") in the magazine Antilliaanse Cahiers . In the 1960s, Arion worked as a correspondent for various magazines and as the main editor of the daily newspaper Encuentro Antilliano , which he co-founded . Furthermore, he held regular readings in the program of the Dutch international radio . Shortly before the end of his studies he broke off this and returned for some time to the Netherlands Antilles, where he dealt with the origin of the local Creole language Papiamentu. He published the results of this research in 1972 under the title Bibliografie van het Papiamentu . In 1971 he decided to continue his studies after all and returned to the Netherlands. After graduating, he found a job at the Institute for Dutch Studies at the University of Amsterdam . Under the impact of the workers' uprising of 1969 in Curaçao, he began this year to work on his debut novel Dubbelspel in which he the example of four Domino a picture of the changing society and culture is characterized playing men of the West Indies at the time. Through the characters in the novel, Arion expresses himself critical of the rebels, whom he indirectly accuses of only destroying instead of wanting to build something together. The novel was finally published in 1973 and was awarded the Lucy B. en CW van der Hoogtprijs a year later . Arion donated the prize money of 1000 ƒ for the fight against apartheid politics in South Africa . In the first half of the 1970s he lived mainly in Amsterdam , where he was involved in the city's Antillian community. In 1975 he published his second novel Afscheid van de koningin here (in German: “Farewell to the Queen”).

In 1975 Arion went to South America, where he accepted a post as a lecturer at an institute for the training of teachers in the Dutch colony of Suriname, which was just becoming independent . Here he married his wife Trudi Guda, with whom he was to father two children. In 1980 the family left Suriname when Desi Bouterses came to power and returned to Arion's homeland, Curacao. There he dealt with the standardization of Papiamentu and began again to research its origin. He was particularly interested in the similarities between Papiamentu and the variants of the Cape Verdean Creole , which are spoken on the islands off the west coast of Africa. He also campaigned for the introduction of Papiamentu as a primary school language on Curaçao, which sometimes brought him into conflict with the local authorities. In this context he founded the private elementary school Skol Humanistiko Erasmo in 1987 , where lessons were held in Papiamentu. During this time, Arion began to be more politically active, which culminated in 1988 in the founding of his own party, the Kambio Radical (“radical reversal”, KARA for short). However, KARA was never able to garner enough votes to win a seat in the island's parliament.

In 1996 Arion received his PhD from the University of Amsterdam. His dissertation was titled The Kiss of a Slave. Papiamentu's West-African Connections and dealt with the origins of Papiamentu and other languages. Among other things, he put forward the thesis that Papiamentu had been influenced more than previously known by the secret language Guene, which was used by the plantation slaves of Curaçao. In addition, the Guene also had an influence on other Caribbean languages ​​and even on the English and Dutch languages.

Frank Martinus Arion died in 2015 after a short illness in his hometown Willemstad.

Order of Orange-Nassau

In 1992 the Dutch state awarded him the Order of Orange-Nassau with the rank of knight. Arion kept this award until 2008 when he returned the medal in protest against the policies of Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende's government . The background to this was the government's intention to link the debt reduction in the Netherlands Antilles to a simultaneous reduction in the islands' political self-government. A process that Arion described as "humiliating and offensive". He also questioned the “friendship” between the Netherlands and the Netherlands Antilles and spoke out in favor of independence for the Antilles if the plans were to be implemented.

plant

  • Stem uit Africa . In: Antilliaanse Cahiers . No. 3 . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 1957, ISBN 978-90-70086-23-7 . (Poetry collection)
  • Bibliography van het Papiamentu . Willemstad 1972.
  • Dubbelspeel . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 1973, ISBN 978-90-234-9839-1 . German edition: Double game . Peter Hammer, 1982, ISBN 978-3-87294-194-7 .
  • Sisyphiliaans alpinisme tegen miten . In: Schrijverscyclus Bzztôh Teater . No. 41 . Bzztôh Teater, Amsterdam 1974.
  • Afscheid van de Koningin . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 1975, ISBN 978-90-234-0515-3 .
  • Instituut voor de Opleiding van Leraren (ed.): Albert Helman, de eenzame jager . Geniet, Paramaribo 1977.
  • Nobele wild . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 1979, ISBN 978-90-234-0682-2 .
  • De ibismensmuis . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 1993, ISBN 978-99904-65-02-0 .
  • De laatste vrijheid . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 1995, ISBN 978-90-234-3429-0 .
  • Universiteit van Amsterdam (Ed.): The Kiss of a Slave. Papiamentu's West-African Connections . Amsterdam 1996, ISBN 978-99904-0-569-9 . (Dissertation)
  • De eternal hond . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 2001, ISBN 978-90-234-0028-8 .
  • One thing is droevig . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 2005, ISBN 978-90-806916-5-0 .
  • De deserteurs . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 2006, ISBN 978-90-234-1494-0 .
  • Intimacies van het schrijven . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 2009, ISBN 978-90-234-2881-7 . (Essay collection)
  • Heimwee en de ruïne . De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam 2013, ISBN 978-90-234-8293-2 . (Poetry collection)

literature

  • Maritza Coomans-Eustatia, Henny Coomans, Wim Rutgers: Drie Curaçaose schrijvers in veelvoud - Boeli van Leeuwen, Tip Marugg, Frank Martinus Arion . Walburg Pers, Zutphen 1991, ISBN 978-90-6011-758-3 .

Web links

Commons : Frank Martinus Arion  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Maritza Coomans-Eustatia, Henny Coomans, Wim Rutgers: Drie Curaçaose schrijvers in veelvoud - Boeli van Leeuwen, Tip Marugg, Frank Martinus Arion . 1st edition. Walburg Pers, Zutphen 1991, ISBN 978-90-6011-758-3 , p. 405-406 .
  2. ↑ Maritza Coomans-Eustatia, Henny Coomans, Wim Rutgers: Drie Curaçaose schrijvers in veelvoud - Boeli van Leeuwen, Tip Marugg, Frank Martinus Arion . 1st edition. Walburg Pers, Zutphen 1991, ISBN 978-90-6011-758-3 , p. 407-408 .
  3. ↑ Wim Rutgers: Schrijven is zilver, spreken is goud: Oratuur, auratuur en literatuur van de Nederlandse Antillen en Aruba . 1st edition. Utrecht University Press , Utrecht 1994, ISBN 99904-921-0-7 , pp. 272 .
  4. ↑ Maritza Coomans-Eustatia, Henny Coomans, Wim Rutgers: Drie Curaçaose schrijvers in veelvoud - Boeli van Leeuwen, Tip Marugg, Frank Martinus Arion . 1st edition. Walburg Pers, Zutphen 1991, ISBN 978-90-6011-758-3 , p. 408-409 .
  5. ↑ Maritza Coomans-Eustatia, Henny Coomans, Wim Rutgers: Drie Curaçaose schrijvers in veelvoud - Boeli van Leeuwen, Tip Marugg, Frank Martinus Arion . 1st edition. Walburg Pers, Zutphen 1991, ISBN 978-90-6011-758-3 , p. 410 .
  6. ^ B. Jos de Roo: Praatjes voor de West: de Wereldomroep en de Antilliaanse en Surinaamse literatuur 1947-1958 . Ed .: Universiteit van Amsterdam. 1st edition. Uitgeverij In de Knipscheer, Amsterdam 2014, ISBN 978-90-6265-892-3 , pp. 235 .
  7. ^ A. James Arnold: English- and Dutch-speaking regions . In: A History of Literature in the Caribbean . tape 2 . John Benjamin Publishing, Amsterdam / Philadelphia 2001, ISBN 90-272-3448-5 , pp. 362 .
  8. ↑ Schrijver Frank Martinus Arion overleden. In: nos.nl. Nederlandse Omroep Stichting, September 28, 2015, accessed on August 7, 2019 (Dutch).
  9. ↑ Frank Martinus Arion geeft lintje terug. In: trouw.nl. December 16, 2008, accessed August 7, 2019 (Dutch).
personal data
SURNAME Arion, Frank Martinus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Martinus, Frank Efraim
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch writer, poet and linguist
DATE OF BIRTH December 17, 1936
PLACE OF BIRTH Willemstad
DATE OF DEATH September 28, 2015
Place of death Willemstad