Eeden, Frederik Willem van (1860–1932)

Dutch poet and novelist. His greatest poetical work is a tragedy for reading, De Broeders/The Brothers (1894), and his novel Van de Koele Meren des Doods/The Deeps of Deliverance (1900) anticipated the psychological novel by several decades. His diaries, Mijn dagboek, published in nine volumes in 1971, reveal the conflict between his sensual and spiritual desires which is a recurrent theme in his work.

Born in Haarlem, Eeden took his degree in medicine at Amsterdam in 1886 and studied psychiatry. In 1885 he became editor and cofounder of the journal De Nieuwe Gids/The New Guide, which was the organ of the younger literary group. In this he published his first novel De Kleine Johannes/Little John (1887), a fairy-tale allegory of the search for ultimate meaning in life. His social ideals led him to start a community centre in Bussum, but this was unsuccessful. In 1922 he was converted to Roman Catholicism.