Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction: Cultural Nationalism and the Rise of Dutch Studies
- 1 Matthijs Siegenbeek in Defence of Dutch
- 2 Barthold Hendrik Lulofs: A ‘Learned Dilettante’
- 3 Poet and Professor: Adam Simons
- 4 Johannes Kinker: A Kantian Philosopher Teaching Dutch Language, Literature, and Eloquence
- 5 Caught Between Propaganda and Science: Ulrich Gerhard Lauts, the Forgotten Father of Dutch Philology in Brussels
- 6 Pieter Weiland and his Nederduitsche Spraakkunst
- 7 Moralist of the Nation: Johannes Henricus van der Palm
- 8 ‘I am Revived as a Belgian’: The Work of Jan Frans Willems
- 9 Adriaan Kluit: Back to the Sources!
- 10 ‘Can Grander Skulls be Crowned?’: Jacob van Dijk’s Posthumous Literary History
- 11 Hendrik van Wijn: Pioneer of Historical Literary Studies in the Netherlands
- 12 The Founding Father of Dutch Literary History: Jeronimo de Vries
- Afterword: Gert-Jan Johannes
- Index
8 - ‘I am Revived as a Belgian’: The Work of Jan Frans Willems
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 February 2021
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction: Cultural Nationalism and the Rise of Dutch Studies
- 1 Matthijs Siegenbeek in Defence of Dutch
- 2 Barthold Hendrik Lulofs: A ‘Learned Dilettante’
- 3 Poet and Professor: Adam Simons
- 4 Johannes Kinker: A Kantian Philosopher Teaching Dutch Language, Literature, and Eloquence
- 5 Caught Between Propaganda and Science: Ulrich Gerhard Lauts, the Forgotten Father of Dutch Philology in Brussels
- 6 Pieter Weiland and his Nederduitsche Spraakkunst
- 7 Moralist of the Nation: Johannes Henricus van der Palm
- 8 ‘I am Revived as a Belgian’: The Work of Jan Frans Willems
- 9 Adriaan Kluit: Back to the Sources!
- 10 ‘Can Grander Skulls be Crowned?’: Jacob van Dijk’s Posthumous Literary History
- 11 Hendrik van Wijn: Pioneer of Historical Literary Studies in the Netherlands
- 12 The Founding Father of Dutch Literary History: Jeronimo de Vries
- Afterword: Gert-Jan Johannes
- Index
Summary
Abstract
Jan Frans Willems (1793-1846) was the most influential literary historian of the Southern Netherlands in the nineteenth century. His work in the period under Willem I (1815-1830) is often regarded as a culmination of his pan-Netherlandic thought, and his unconditional love for the North and Willem I's politics. He would be a foreman of Dutch supporters and a prominent Orangist in the South. This article shows, however, that he choosed a southern perspective already before the start of the Flemish Movement: his work illustrates his belief that the national literature didn't only consist of a Northern literary style and tradition but that the national literary heritage comprised two equal Northern and Southern parts.
Keywords: Southern Netherlands, Flemish Movement, Jan Frans Willems, literary history, nineteenth century
Introduction
Everything was taken from him, even the name Belgian. […]
But now I am revived as a Belgian, in this blessed hour,
– I sing my freedom … on a shattered wall.
In his poem De puyn-hoopen rondom Antwerpen (‘The rubble around Antwerp’, 1814) Jan Frans Willems (1793-1846) expresses the devastation of his hometown Antwerp and the disillusionment of its citizens, after the departure of the French in the summer of 1814. But at the same time, the liberation created room for Willems to dream about the future and a revival as a ‘Belgian’ – an identity that, according to the poem, had been under pressure since Napoleon captured the Southern Netherlands.
For this particular part of the Low Countries, the construction of national identity in the period 1780-1830 is extremely complex. Firstly, there was no Belgian nation in this respect. After a long Habsburgian period and the short-lived independence in 1789, the Southern Netherlands had fallen to Austria (1790), France (1792), Austria again (1793), and to France once more in 1794. After Napoleon's defeat, the European superpowers Prussia, Austria, England, and Russia decided at the Congress of Vienna (1814-1815) to merge the Southern and Northern Netherlands under a sovereign from the House of Orange, Willem, in order to prevent new expansion by imperious France. This United Kingdom of the Netherlands soon fell apart in European revolutionary year 1830, after which Belgium became independent under King Leopold I.
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- Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2018