What do you think?
Rate this book
The Queer Dutchman
In 1725, a sailor accused of "unnatural acts" by his officers due to his affection for his ward aboard a Dutch ship was forcibly marooned on Ascension Island. This account is drawn from the actual journals of the sailor, Jan Svilt, which chronicled his experiences on the dry desert island in the South Atlantic. Set against a background of puritanical and avaricious Holland, exotic Batavia, and licentious Capetown, this book is a unique and captivating reading experience.
144 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1979
4 people are currently reading
42 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 30, 2020
very disturbing book. His island is NOT the Blue Lagoon, it's an actual deserted island. There was no Brooke Shields, no mangoes or bananas, no fresh water. Fascinating book- i read it as a teenager.
September 16, 2008
The story of The Queer Dutchman is fascinating and extraordinary. Its clear spoken and most unfortunate narrator is Jan Svilt, a Dutch sailor forcibly marooned on Ascension Island in the South Atlantic, after being accused of and tortured into confessing "unnatural acts." He keeps a detailed journal during his 5 month sojourn on the dry desert of an island, and his harrowing, hungry, and captivating experience is the main force of the book.
According to a postscript at the beginning of the book, the English translation was made by Michael Jelstra of Delpht, and then annotated by Peter Agnos of Mexico. This account is then interleaved with historical research done by Cy Adler of Green Eagle Press, the publisher of The Queer Dutchman (for whom I wrote this review).
The book has marvelous potential, and as Adler points out, it's great movie material. The background given on 1700's seafaring cities and the sailing life gives context and heft to Svilt's story. It's unclear whether the captain's report at the end of the book, or the meeting of the "High Seventeen" in Amsterdam are also researched additions by Adler but they provide for valuable backstory. However, the book needs to be restructured, expanded, and closely edited. Rearranging the order of chapters, interspersing (and increasing the scope of) the factual research with Svilt's account, and correcting simple grammatical and syntactical issues, would make The Queer Dutchman a far more narratively powerful book. As it stands now, the chapters are not well integrated, and the footnotes and interleaved chapters jerk readers out of the story and remind them that they're reading contributions by at least four different authors.
Even so, reading this book is like discovering some lost treasure map, a lonely, desperate, and elegant confession of a man whose arguably normal instincts lead him into an abnormal and tortured place. One is left with the hope that Svilt's nightmare of Christian hell is not his just reward.
According to a postscript at the beginning of the book, the English translation was made by Michael Jelstra of Delpht, and then annotated by Peter Agnos of Mexico. This account is then interleaved with historical research done by Cy Adler of Green Eagle Press, the publisher of The Queer Dutchman (for whom I wrote this review).
The book has marvelous potential, and as Adler points out, it's great movie material. The background given on 1700's seafaring cities and the sailing life gives context and heft to Svilt's story. It's unclear whether the captain's report at the end of the book, or the meeting of the "High Seventeen" in Amsterdam are also researched additions by Adler but they provide for valuable backstory. However, the book needs to be restructured, expanded, and closely edited. Rearranging the order of chapters, interspersing (and increasing the scope of) the factual research with Svilt's account, and correcting simple grammatical and syntactical issues, would make The Queer Dutchman a far more narratively powerful book. As it stands now, the chapters are not well integrated, and the footnotes and interleaved chapters jerk readers out of the story and remind them that they're reading contributions by at least four different authors.
Even so, reading this book is like discovering some lost treasure map, a lonely, desperate, and elegant confession of a man whose arguably normal instincts lead him into an abnormal and tortured place. One is left with the hope that Svilt's nightmare of Christian hell is not his just reward.
June 30, 2011
I am not sure how I came across this book, but it is (in part) the journal of a Dutch sailor left to die on a deserted island in 1725 after he’d been caught snogging with his male cousin. The story behind the story is that Jan Svilt’s notes were found years after his death on Ascension Island (to which I remain skeptical in these post-Blair Witch days). In one aspect, a terrifying prospect which debunks the romanticism applied to being on a permanent island vacation, on the flipside not a terrific amount to keep the reader engaged. What I enjoyed was the editor’s addition of background information which is interspersed between the chapters of the journal, as well as the devolution of the increasingly desperate narrator.
October 16, 2010
It's interesting, a story based on a translation of a castaway's diary in the 18th century. Just been wondering how it feels like to be isolated in an island of nothing. Told in a very simple way, yet one could imagine the desperation of a human being alone, suffering both mentally and physically. In the end, he died after 6 months, which I've known ever since I haven't read the book. In fact, the reason why I read the book is my curiosity of his suffering to death.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews