The first picture book that illustrator Leo Timmers made together with author Jean Reidy for Bloomsbury USA was All Through My Town. Querido’s Publishers (Amsterdam) published the Dutch edition, translated by Bart Moeyaert. The book was awarded the acclaimed Zilveren Griffel (Silver Pencil) in 2014.

Now the second picture book by Timmers and Reidy is coming up: Busy Builders, Busy Week! will be published in July 2016. There’s already an early review in Publishers Weekly: “Timmers’s acrylic paintings present big-eyed, cheerful animals busy on the job using realistic looking tools and trucks. The brown of the dirt lot and fence (which gets a makeover, too) contrast with increasing splashes of color—the animals themselves, as well as the whimsical playground fixtures. The result is a joyful cacophony of color and activity.”

The Dutch edition (Querido’s Publishers) will be out in June 2016, translated by Bart Moeyaert.

In 2014 Bart Moeyaert was appointed artistic director of Guest of Honour Flanders & The Netherlands at the Frankfurt Book Fair 2016. It was known for some time that the Board of Directors of the Flemish Literature Fund and the Supervisory Board of the Dutch Foundation for Literature would take responsibility for organizing the programme, but the entire book industry was eagerly anticipating the appointment of the project’s artistic director.

“In choosing Bart Moeyaert the two foundations are clearly opting for an enterprising author who is held in high regard by his colleagues, by the public and by the media, in both Flanders and the Netherlands. Moeyaert is an internationally renowned author with an extensive network in many foreign countries and translations in twenty-one languages. Nineteen of Moeyaert’s books have been published in German translation, most of them by Hanser Verlag. He has a strong relationship with the German language area, where he regularly holds workshops and appears on stage at festivals. He has been attending the Frankfurt Book Fair for twenty-five years and knows it from the inside out.”

Bart Moeyaert has been developing the concept for this large project, mapping the Dutch-speaking regions from a literary and cultural point of view, and is currently working together with a very strong team. He adds a chapter to his blog every Friday, so you can read all about his work and plans for FBM16.

In 2003, Bart became the head tutor on the writing course at the Royal Conservatoire in Antwerp.

His novella Graz, which the Stan theatre group also produced on stage as a monologue upon its publication in March 2009, received an extremely positive response from critics, and became something of an insider tip.

At the request of violinist Janine Jansen, Bart adapted L’Histoire du Soldat in 2011, the story by Ramuz that Stravinsky based his composition on. The result was Iemands lief (Someone’s Sweetheart).

The compilation Jij en ik en alle andere kinderen (You and Me and All the Other Children), marked Bart Moeyaert’s thirty years as a writer. The year 2013 was all about the celebration of this anniversary.

In January 2015 Bart concluded the trilogy that he and The Nederlands Blazers Ensemble began with De Schepping (Creation) and continued with Het Paradijs (Paradise). The third part was De Hemel (Heaven).

foto (c) Ans Brys

Bart Moeyaert made a surprising debut as a poet in 2003 with Verzamel de liefde (Collecting Love).

Three years later, he was appointed as the City Poet of Antwerp for two years. For his work he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Antwerp. His second anthology of poetry was Gedichten voor gelukkige mensen (Poems for Happy People) in 2008. After his period as City Poet, Bart deliberately chose to spend some time out of the limelight.

foto (c) Marco Mertens

Bart appeared on stage more and more frequently: occasionally as an actor — as, for example, in Bremen is niet ver (Bremen Isn’t Far), but usually in literary programs in a theatrical setting, like ‘Geletterde Mensen’ — i.g. in 2004, with Erwin Mortier and Adriaan van Dis (pictured).
In 2004 Bart presented De Schepping (Creation), with the Nederlands Blazers Ensemble, the first part of a trilogy, which was followed by the second part Het Paradijs (Paradise) in 2010, and finally by De Hemel (Heaven) in 2015.

He has been invited by various bodies to undertake reading tours in different countries, following his books on a journey around the world, to places including South Africa, Suriname, Japan, Sweden, Canada, Italy, France, and the German-speaking countries.

In 1992 Bart Moeyaert became the editor of a magazine for young people. Three years later, he decided to dedicate himself full-time to writing. He left the publishing house where he had made his debut and moved to Querido, where Blote handen (Bare Hands) was published in 1995. The book has been translated into eight languages, winning many awards (including the Zilveren Griffel, the Boekenleeuw and the Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis), and marking the beginning of a new phase in Bart’s work.

Bart Moeyaert no longer restricted himself to fiction alone. De Standaard Magazine commissioned him to write in-depth articles about design, two of his television screenplays were filmed, in 1998 he worked with Joke van Leeuwen to create a theatre programme as part of the ‘Geletterde Mensen’ series, and he wrote his first play for Theater Luxemburg, Rover, dronkeman (Robber, drunkard), which was later translated and also performed in German. When, in 2000, Bart trod the boards with the stories from Broere (Brothers), it felt like a gift: the audience was as diverse as he’d always dreamed of.

Bart’s diary had its first and only mention of ‘the book that’s finished’ on 7 November 1980. The book in question, Duet met valse noten (Off-Key Duet), came out on 1 October 1983. Four months after publication, the book was already being reprinted. At that point, Bart Moeyaert was still at school. He left the Kunsthumaniora artistic high school in Ghent, and went on to study Dutch, German and history in Brussels. Duet met valse noten won awards, was translated, and was given a new life as a musical. The book became a modern classic.

After his studies, Bart Moeyaert moved from Brussels to Antwerp — to Nieuwstad 14, the address that would later become a poem. Bart’s house overlooked the theatre where his Kus me (Kiss Me, 1994), Broere (Brothers, 2000), Bremen is niet ver (Bremen Isn’t Far, 2001) and Café Geluk (Café Happiness, 2007) would later appear on the posters. He worked freelance for the magazine Flair, reviewed children’s books and translated articles.

He wrote an extended article for the magazine about the life of Astrid Lindgren, and made his debut as a translator from German with Der neue Pinocchio by Christine Nöstlinger. More translations followed, from German (Jürg Schubiger), French (Frédéric Clément, Chris Donner) and English (Carolyn Coman, Shaun Tan).

On 1 September 1970, Bart went to school for the first time. He had a book for practising his reading. In the opening chapter of Pietertje Broms jeugdjaren (Pietertje Brom’s Childhood Years) by J.P. Baljé, he underlined every word in pencil, leaving out the words of three syllables, as they were too difficult. He knew the alphabet had power. Following the example of Pietertje Brom, Bart went out to catch frogs, armed with a bucket that was far too big. He didn’t realize that the book was from a time when streams were still teeming with frogs and sticklebacks. The ditch near the house was black and dead. His catch of zero proved it: life in books was rich and big and so much more interesting than real life.

In June 1974, Bart published his first house newspaper, seven copies, all typed out. A year later, he wrote his first long story — which he called a book. In 1978, he took two steps at once: on 18 June he read out his poem “Treurlied om de Schepping” (Elegy to Creation) on the Hartewens show on Belgian Radio 2. On 27 June, Stipkrant, the children’s section of the paper De Standaard, published the poem “Kwaak!” (Ribbit!), written by Michiel Verberne. Bart was delighted, but regretted using a pseudonym, as no one believed the poem was his.

On 9 June 1964, the seventh son of Omer Moeyaert and Henriette Smessaert was born: Bart Boudewijn Peter. It was morning, twenty to eight. He was the seventh son in a row. A gift was sent from the Royal Palace. It was delivered specially: a golden cup and a golden spoon engraved with a crown and the letter B. There was some discussion about the letter. The engraved letter was the B for King Boudewijn. But perhaps it was also B for Bart. The tradition in Belgium is that the seventh son in a row automatically has the king as his godfather.

Bart Moeyaert’s mother was born on 18 January 1926: Henriette Smessaert, the only daughter of the gardener and the caretaker at Kasteel Gruuthuse, a castle in Oostkamp, in the Belgian province of West Flanders. Bart’s father, Omer Moeyaert, was born a stone’s throw away from the castle, on 14 January 1927, the second son of a railway construction crew foreman and the manageress of a shoe shop. On 1 August 1950, Henriette, a chambermaid, and Omer, a teacher, got married. They lived for some time at Kasteel Gruuthuse, before later moving to the house they built in Bruges.