Marinus Willem de Visser

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Marinus Willem de Visser (born October 23, 1875 in Stavenisse , † October 7, 1930 in Leiden ) was a Dutch Japanologist and sinologist .

Life

Origin, education

Coming from a family of doctors, de Visser began studying classical philology at the University of Leiden in 1893 after completing school in Breda , which he completed in 1900 with a dissertation De Graecorum diis non referentibus speciem humanam . Before submitting his doctoral thesis, he had visited Berlin , Paris and London in order to sift through ethnological comparison material in the local collections and museums for his study, which initially dealt with the area of ​​ancient Greek culture. The dissertation placed the largely anthropomorphic Greek world of gods within the framework of world cultures and presented for the first time in context the ancient Greek evidence for aniconical (non-image or non-human) ideas of deity.

Studied and worked as a translator in Tokyo

In accordance with his interests, he continued his comparative work under the sinologist Gustaav Schlegel and the ethnologist and sinologist Jan Jakob Maria de Groot , whom he admired . His decision to enter the service of the Dutch colonial administration like de Groot and to gain practical language and cultural experience there led him (after his marriage) to the diplomatic service in Tokyo in 1904 , where he - like de Groot in Batavia at the time / Jakarta - worked as a translator ( tolk ) at the Dutch Embassy. Unlike his teacher, who made his experiences under the most adventurous circumstances, de Visser preferred the study with the books to field research, which earned him the nickname "the scholar" at the embassy. However, his zeal for work and productivity enabled him to practice both Chinese and Japanese orally and in writing and - at least during the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) - to publish without interruption. In 1909 he traveled back to the Netherlands via Siberia - initially on vacation.

Museum curator and university professor

In 1910 Visser was appointed curator of the Far East Department of the Ethnological Museum in Leiden. His work The Dragon in China and Japan from 1913, based on the Japanese preparatory work, is still one of the classics of comparative cultural studies today and combined knowledge of Indology , Sinology and Japanese studies with those of ethnology, for which he received the prestigious Stanislas Julien Prize in 1914 . His work on The Boddhisattva Ti-Tsan ( Jizo ) in China and Japan , published in 1915, was also cross-disciplinary and transnational . As a result, he received the Chair of Japanese Studies in Leiden in 1917. His comparative studies, now in the field of Buddhology , he continued in 1923 with The Arhats in China and Japan , which was dedicated to the rich art and religious-historical tradition of the companions and saints of the historical Buddha. Shinto and Taoism had attracted his attention early on, as did religious topics with an ethnological background, such as The Fox and Badger in Japanese Folklore (1908) or The Dog and the Cat in Japanese Superstition (1909). Teaching, publishing and research activities filled him completely up to his death.

Family life, household

De Visser was married three times (1909-?, 1916-24 and 1928-1930). He died in 1930 after prolonged stomach ailments, suffering from depression and insomnia and completely overworked at the age of only 54; he left a son.

Criticism, Meaning, and Personality

  • "De Visser was an extremely diligent worker and always ready to share his knowledge or go to endless efforts to clarify any details about which he had been asked for advice. Always friendly, he was always friendly to his students Always accessible. His expertise was solid and precise, as he never jumped to conclusions.… Details seemed to sort themselves out under his hand and were then presented by him in a clear, simple form, be it in Dutch or German, although he was perhaps not a penetrating and synthetic head in the true sense of the word. "
  • " Cozy ... in this word his ideal of life was expressed."
  • "... but since there is no source criticism, the treatise is often only apparently chronological ... [his" enyclopaedic "method] stacks the centuries on top of one another, but never penetrates to a single century."
  • "What made his knowledge at times flat, despite all the liveliness and enthusiasm with which it was presented, was the absence of an interpretive thought, of depth and contour."
  • "Knowledge of human nature was of course not one of his characteristics."
  • "In zeal and dedication, however, he could not be surpassed. They allowed him to succeed and bring him to bear more than many others of perhaps greater caliber. He worked with the brittle material from morning to night, and he did not shrink from the most arduous texts. ... There was something of the Japanese spirit in him when it came to attention to detail ... Almost childish and naive in many commonplace matters ... a meek person. "

Fonts (in selection)

  • De Graecorum diis non referentibus speciem humanam (Phil.Diss. Leiden 1900), expanded and in German udT The non-human gods of the Greeks (1903)
  • The Dragon in China and Japan (1913)
  • The Boddhisattva Ti-Tsan (Jizo) in China and Japan (1915)
  • The Arhats in China and Japan (1923)
  • Shinto en Taoisme in Japan (1930)

literature

  • JJL Duyvendak : Nécrologue (in English). In: T'oung Pao . Second Series, Vol. 27, No. 4/5 (1930), pp. 451-454. www.jstor.org/stable/4526956
  • JJL Duyvendak: Levensbericht van Marinus Willem de Visser (in Dutch). In: Jaarboek van de Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde, 1931 (1931) , p. 164 f. www.dbnl.org/tekst/_jaa003193101_01/_jaa003193101_01_0024.php

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Revised and in German under the title The non-human gods of the Greeks , Leiden: Brill 1903
  2. ↑ See his obituary for de Groot in the Jaarboek van de Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde, 1922 (1922) - Jaarboek van de Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde 1901-2000: http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_jaa003192201_01/_jaa003192201_01_0012.php
  3. ↑ Ancient Greek, "combining to form a unit, combining"
  4. ↑ Duyvendak, Nécrologie p. 452 (translated from English)
  5. ↑ Duyvendak, Levensbericht p. 164 (translated from the Dutch)
  6. ↑ Duyvendak, Levensbericht p. 166 f.
  7. ↑ Duyvendak, Levensbericht p. 169
  8. ↑ Duyvendak, Levensbericht p. 169
  9. ↑ Duyvendak, Levensbericht p. 170
personal data
SURNAME Visser, Marinus Willem de
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch japanologist and sinologist
DATE OF BIRTH October 23, 1875
PLACE OF BIRTH Stavenisse
DATE OF DEATH October 7, 1930
Place of death Suffer