Janwillem van de Wetering

Janwillem Lincoln van de Wetering (February 12, 1931 in Rotterdam – July 4, 2008 in Blue Hill, Maine) was the author of a number of works in English and Dutch. He was particularly noted for his detective fiction, his most popular creations being Grijpstra and de Gier, a pair of Amsterdam police officers who figure in a lengthy series of novels and short stories. The mysteries are rich with images from Amsterdam, where they take place; some also feature a cat named Oliver. He also wrote stories for children and nonfiction works. He usually wrote in Dutch and then in English; the two versions often differ considerably.

Van de Wetering was born and raised in Rotterdam, but in later years he lived in South Africa, Japan, London, Colombia, Peru, Australia, Amsterdam and most recently in Surry, Maine, the setting of two of his Grijpstra and de Gier novels and his children's series about the porcupine Hugh Pine. His many travels and his experiences in a Zen Buddhist monastery and as a member of the Amsterdam Special Constabulary ("being a policeman in one's spare time" as he phrased it in his introduction to "Outsider in Amsterdam") lent authenticity to his works of fiction and nonfiction.

Van de Wetering was awarded the French Grand Prix de Littérature Policière in 1984.

Bibliography

Grijpstra and de Gier novels

* "Outsider in Amsterdam", 1975
* "Tumbleweed", 1976
* "The Corpse on the Dike", 1976
* "Death of a Hawker", 1977
* "The Japanese Corpse", 1977
* "The Blond Baboon", 1978
* "The Maine Massacre", 1979
* "The Mind-Murders", 1981
* "The Streetbird", 1983
* "The Rattle-Rat", 1985
* "Hard Rain", 1986
* "Just A Corpse at Twilight", 1994
* "The Hollow-Eyed Angel", 1996
* "The Perfidious Parrot", 1997
* "The Amsterdam Cops: Collected Stories", 1999 (anthology)
** replaces the anthology "The Sergeant's Cat and Other Stories"

Children's books

* "Little Owl", 1978
* "Hugh Pine", 1980
* "Hugh Pine and the Good Place", 1981
* "Hugh Pine and Something Else", 1983

Other fiction

* "The Butterfly Hunter", 1982
* "Bliss and Bluster", 1982
* "Inspector Saito's Small Satori", 1985 (anthology)
* "Murder by Remote Control", 1986 (graphic novel, with Paul Kirchner)
* "Seesaw Millions", 1988
* "Mangrove Mama and Other Tropical Tales of Terror", 1995 (anthology)
* "Judge Dee Plays His Lute: A Play and Selected Mystery Stories", 1997 (anthology; includes the original play "Judge Dee Plays his Lute" and a selection from other anthologies)

Non-fiction

* "The Empty Mirror: Experiences in a Japanese Zen Monastery", 1971
* "A Glimpse of Nothingness: Experiences in an American Zen Community", 1975
* "Robert Van Gulik: His Life, His Work", 1988
* "Afterzen: Experiences of a Zen Student out on His Ear", 1999

Articles/stories not included in books

* "Astral Bodies and Tantric Sex." The New York Times, January 10, 1988. (review of a two-volume biography of Alexandra David-Néel)
* "The Way Life Should Be - Maine: coastline on a clean, cold sea." The Nation, September 1, 2003.

Translations

*Alexandra David-Néel and Lama Yongden: "The Power of Nothingness." Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1982 (French to English, with an introduction by the translator)
*Van de Wetering translated many books from English to Dutch and two books from French to Dutch.

Unpublished in English

* "De doosjesvuller en andere vondsten" (The boxfiller and other findings), 1984 (essays in Dutch)
* "Waar zijn we aan begonnen?" (What have we started?), 1985 (essays in Dutch on the stages of life with the psychologist Hans van Rappard)
* "Eugen Eule und der Fall des verschwundenen Flohs ", 2001 (children's book in German)
* "Die entartete Seezunge", 2004 (inspired by the World War 2 bombing of Rotterdam and the 9/11 disaster in NYC) (a novel in German, appeared as an article in Dutch)

Filmography

* "Grijpstra and de Gier" (Netherlands, 1979), based on the novel "Outsider in Amsterdam", script by Wim Verstappen
* "Rattlerat" (Netherlands, 1987), script by Wim Verstappen
* "Der blonde Affe" (Germany, 1985), based on the novel "The Blond Baboon"

Television

* A TV series based on the Grijpstra and de Gier characters started airing on Dutch TV in 2004, 30 episodes are made, another 15 are ordered. Roef Hagas and Jack Wouterse play youthful versions of de Gier and Grijpstra.
* CBS aired a TV special featuring the original Hugh Pine novel ("Storybreak" #12).

Radio

* Van de Wetering wrote 4 radio plays for German TV, again based on the Grijpstra and de Gier series. The plays were aired during the early nineties. Among these is "Das Koan" (1994), based on Van de Wetering's biography of Robert van Gulik, creator of the Judge Dee series. The English version, "Judge Dee Plays His Lute", was included in the anthology with the same name.

External links

* [http://www.avramdavidson.org/wetering.htm The Philosophical Exercises of Janwillem van de Wetering]
* [http://cgi.omroep.nl/cgi-bin/streams?/tv/bos/archief/bb.20040509.rm Buddhist Network Television Interview with Janwillem van de Wetering, in Dutch]