Johan Winkler

Johan Winkler (born October 6, 1898 in Haarlem , † September 27, 1986 in Deventer ) was a Dutch journalist , author and translator . From 1930 he was responsible for all the daily newspapers of the publishing house “De Arbeiderspers” and from 1948 to 1955 he was editor-in-chief of the political weekly newspaper Vrij Nederland .

Life

Of reformed origin, Winkler first studied theology in Leiden and Amsterdam , but broke off this course prematurely. Afterwards he mostly studied on the side - he had been a member of the SDAP since 1919 and a year later for two years personal secretary of Pieter Jelles Troelstra - German studies . After he had already obtained a degree in German for the middle school in 1921, Winkler completed this course in 1924 with the candidate examination.

After a short time as a teacher at a Christian middle school in Amsterdam, Winkler came to Het Volk , the mouthpiece of the SDAP, as a proofreader and reporter in 1923 ( continued as Het Vrije Volk after the Second World War ). In 1927 he was appointed editor of the Rotterdam newspaper Vorwaarts . After both sheets were merged in 1928 in the new Amsterdam publisher “De Arbeiderspers”, which was owned by the SDAP and the trade union federation “Nederlandsch Verbond van Vakvereenigingen”, Winkler was brought back from Rotterdam in 1930 and became the editorial and publishing director of all daily newspapers appointed by the publisher.

In the 1930s Winkler had a permanent column with the name "Geestelijk Leven", in which he dealt with progressive forces in the church and the church dispute in Germany. When in August 1940, during the early days of the German occupation of the Netherlands, Het Volk came under the control of the occupiers and all Jewish employees were dismissed, Winkler left the newspaper and worked briefly for the Algemeen Handelsblad . He then co-founded the “Amsterdamse Boeken Courantenmaatschappij” publishing house, which primarily provided work for those who had just lost their jobs. However, when the publishing house was also targeted by the German occupiers in 1943, Winkler and his wife went into hiding. At that time he was also an employee of the "Eerste Nederlandse Systematis Ingerichte Encyclopædie".

After the war, Winkler was briefly deputy editor-in-chief of the Algemeen Handelsblad , but in 1946 he moved to the former resistance newspaper Het Parool in the same position . In 1948 he took up the position of second editor-in-chief of the ailing weekly newspaper Vrij Nederland alongside Henk van Randwijk . This step was due to the financial support of Vrij Nederland by Het Parool , which had been going on for some time . A merger of Vrij Nederland with the like-minded weekly De Groene Amsterdammer , which Het Parool wanted, did not materialize, among other things, because the editors refused to accept van Randwijk as editor-in-chief. The relationship between van Randwijk and Winkler turned out to be difficult, and in 1950 the former finally left the editorial office. Like van Randwijk, Winkler was also an opponent of the colonial war in the Dutch East Indies , so that he left the SDAP successor party PvdA as a result. In 1955, Winkler's time at Vrij Nederland came to an end , due to, among other things, differences of opinion with the newspaper's editorial board, which was partly made up of representatives from social and political groups.

After working as a freelance journalist for a few years, Winkler became editor-in-chief of the newspapers published there at "de Kluwerpers" in 1961, including the Deventer Dagblad (now an edition of De Stentor ). Even after his retirement in 1965, Winkler worked as a journalist.

In addition to his journalistic activities, Winkler has translated works by Willy Brandt , Leszek Kołakowski , Erich Kuttner , Kaj Munk , Rainer Maria Rilke , Upton Sinclair and Stefan Zweig . Furthermore, he was also active as an author sporadically, so Winkler wrote two books about his former boss Troelstra and also dedicated his authorship to Munk and Albert Schweitzer , with whom he dealt extensively. He addressed his Christian-socialist attitude in "De grote ontmoeting (van Christendom en Socialisme)".

Winkler was a member of the “Commissie Kerk en Samenleving van de Nederlandse Hervormde kerk” (Commission Church and Coexistence of the Dutch Reformed Church), as well as being an honorary member of the “Nederlandse Vereniging van Journalisten” (NVJ, Dutch Association of Journalists) and the “Genootschap van Vertalers” “(Society of Translators). He received Dutch, Danish and French awards.

Works

• Pieter Jelles Troelstra , Querido, Amsterdam 1933
• Jan , Arbeiderspers, Amsterdam 1937
• De Grote Ontmoeting (van Christendom en Socialisme) , Arbeiderspers, Amsterdam 1937
• Café in Antwerp , Amsterdamsche Boek- en Courantenmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1946
• Profeet van een nieuwe tijd. Leven en streven van mr. Pieter Jelles Troelstra , Amsterdamsche Boek- en Courantenmaatschappij, Amsterdam 1948
• Kaj Munk, dominee, poet, martelaar (with Niels Njgaard), DA Daamen, Den Haag 1950
• Naar het land van Brazza en Albert Schweitzer , DA Daamen, Amsterdam 1951
• In Gods naam. Eight levens voor others , Arbeiderspers, Amsterdam 1960

swell

literature

• Jan van de Plasse: Kroniek van de Nederlandse dagblad- en opiniepers / seed gesteld by Jan van de Plasse. Red. Wim Verbei , Otto Cramwinckel Uitgever, Amsterdam 2005, ISBN 90-75727-77-1 . (Dutch; earlier edition: Jan van de Plasse, Kroniek van de Nederlandse dagbladpers , Cramwinckel, Amsterdam 1999, ISBN 90-75727-25-9 )

On-line

• Biographical Woordenboek van Nederland (Dutch)