The Boundless River: Stories from the Realm of the Rhine

(Paperback)

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In The Boundless River, Mathijs Deen takes the reader into his unique world: the twilight zone between fact and fiction, science and imagination. "If the river is a character, then it must have a birth and a death. Tell me how it came about." Mathijs Deen asks his table companion, a geologist, on a sunny September day.

The answer that follows is the beginning of a journey that takes the reader from a time long before we spoke of a European continent to the present day, when skippers still see the Rhine as a living being.

From the mighty hippos that grazed the banks millions of years ago to the weary salmon that saw its habitat slowly change, from the primordial girl of Steinheim to the Roman general Corbulo, the young Goethe and the North Sea fisherman Kommer Tanis: Deen tells their stories, in which the Rhine is always present, sometimes as the main character, sometimes as an extra. He shows how the river connects and divides, terrifies, comforts, carries and swallows, since the beginning of time.

Translated by Jane Hedley Prole and Jonathan Reeder

Reviews

Deen has an impressive historical knowledge that enables him to travel effortlessly through the centuries. * De Volkskrant *
An extraordinary capacity for empathy, a sound style, conscientious research and a flair for succinct details. Each story is a sketch of a life, of a society, of a zeitgeist. * De Morgen *
Like Geert Mak, he knows how to bring history to life, thanks to his compelling style and his poetic imagination. * De Volkskrant *
Deen is an exceptional prose stylist * Het Parool *

Author Bio

MATHIJS DEEN (b. 1962) is a Dutch writer and radio producer. His short story collection Brutus is Hungry (nominated for the AKO Literature Prize) was followed by among others The Wadden Islands, Down Old Roads and the novel The Light Ship (nominated for the Libris Literature Prize). His work has been translated into German, Italian and Korean.