It’s peaceful in this house in Sant Lluís, Menorca, where Cees Nooteboom and his wife Simone have lived for more than 40 summers. Everything comes together to prevent you from approaching this palace of silence, where the Netherlands’ most important writer describes life with a serenity that belittles contemporary noise, although he pays close attention to what’s going on. He speaks not only the language that greets him, but an even more important language, the language of the eyes. When he wants to say this or that and give it a meaning that words cannot convey, he winks, laughs or smiles, puts both hands on his chest and lets you react by smiling like a Buddha. This interview stems from the fact that it commemorates the 15th anniversary of one of Siruela’s most prized books, Red Rain, an homage to this garden that welcomes us. He was orphaned by the Second World War, but to get a word of grudge from him, you have to look for someone else, because this world traveler was not born here who finds peace and writing, replacing poetry and prose every year. as if he had two breaths.
This interview was done in the Renaissance-looking studio that a friend of mine, an architect, had made for him, now in his neighborhood of cacti, one of them was given a flower, which he caressed at the end. Speech in which his capacity to go beyond the subject is manifested, which is also a sign of his writings. He’s about to turn 90.
In your book you ask yourself the question, Which house am I returning to? Which house are you returning to?
My forthcoming book consists of articles on music. In half a year my full poems will come. So in the Netherlands. In Germany they have now published four books of my poems about Japan. Look at that Dutch cover, there’s a tile that represents my life as a traveller.
Yes, but which house is he returning to? Tell me.
Well, there are three houses. Both are mine. An old house in the Netherlands, from 1730, between two canals in Amsterdam. I have a library there. We have a German friend who has a house in the woods near the Austrian-Swiss border and he lets us go there. Because he only uses it two or three months a year. But now he saw me old and said: “I don’t want you to go this autumn, because I don’t want you to die in my house” (laughs). Well, he called me the next day: “I’m sorry for what I said to you yesterday.” But what has been said has been said, huh. And now I know they’re thinking of my death. Anyway: I really like being here at this gem of Menorca. And here there are trees everywhere.
So this is your house. which one does it go back to
Yes, this is my house. But in general we live very isolated here. That’s why I want to go back to Amsterdam from time to time. Now I’ll go to the medical stuff, and then there will be an exhibition by the Italian artist Penone, where there are topics that interest me a lot and that are somehow also in my literature. But we thought of coming back here later because the winter there is a bit sad. And here the tourists will be long gone (laughs). Despite the overcrowding, Menorca is always good. There is a lot of nature, so we love it. Ibiza is different, unfortunately.
I reread this book and thought I could interview him for every chapter, because it is full of reflections on every period of his life. And from Menorca. Menorca is always available.
It must be said that for many the world is already very small. Everything is connected, that’s true. But it’s huge. I have visited many places and I can say that it is quite large. They say there must be another planet full of people. We do not know. In all their trips to space, they still haven’t found him. Look: We’re rare in the universe (laughs).
He says the day will come when his file will be full. But isn’t it impossible for an author’s file to be full?
But we are mortal. At a certain moment: stop. When you think of writing something interesting, it comes to mind.
to your own file.
Yes, and so we go. Today I read about people who lived three thousand years ago. But I believe people forget more than we contribute.
He says we’re going crazy before we forget.
Yes, of course.
What would you like to forget?
I just don’t know. Maybe I’ve already forgotten (laughs). No, look: when I was in Catholic boarding school, I wanted to run away. Also from my first marriage. All right, now I’m looking for that girl I occasionally fell in love with and then broke up with, and we talk without any grudges. I’ve been with Simone now for 42 years. He’s younger, which is good. My friend who built this house has also disappeared, but I always think of him: look how well he did it. He was German, spoke terrible Spanish, but had a very good relationship with the Menorcan artisans. But… in this country when people say something they don’t do it, then they do it. But he is not. It has always worked very well.
It also says that you associate past trips with future trips.
However, there is no guarantee that this will always be the case. There is a possibility of mistake when I want to evoke the past. I lived through part of the war, my father died in the war, then I was in Budapest in 1948, then Paris in 1968, and then German reunification in 1988. We’ve been through a lot. And I have traveled a lot. By the way, I always look at the local history of the places I go. From here, also from Menorca.
He talks about the misery of war in many episodes. Does the war continue to wreak havoc on your memory?
I don’t know if I should say that. There is a comforting quote from TS Eliot: “Sometimes I don’t understand my poems.” That’s a very honest thing, isn’t it? And also interesting. From time to time I believe I have found someone or something I do not know in my creations.
But let’s go to war. Now we are in another war that takes place in the same geography with the other.
It’s a tragedy, yes. It is a complete misunderstanding of the Russians. This is stupid. If they manage to dominate Ukraine one day, it will always be a hotbed for them. What happened there is very symbolic. Europe was left alone. And if Trump comes back to power, because there are those who still want him, or it looks like America will no longer be there to support us. This is very dangerous. Well, I’m already 89 years old and I don’t know if I’m going to see this or something else but I know all this is going to be a problem. There are also Chinese. And now the Chinese seem to be friends with the Russians, but I do not know what will happen next. Because two authoritarian systems, that is…
Can an intellectual ignore the future?
Nerd. If that happens, I don’t know what could happen. Today I see many Russians enthusiastically following this war. Many are against it, but they cannot open their mouths. They are sent to prison. Or they kill.
But what I mean is that a person cannot remain unaware of what has happened and will happen.
Well, I’m old now, I’ve seen a lot, and one day I’ll disappear and the world will go on. I will go and you will continue.
Didn’t you get rid of your skepticism?
No. I’m still here in my cell. I’m not a monk, but it’s almost a cell, isn’t it? Every night at half past nine I listen to the news from the Netherlands and Germany. And I want to know what happened here in the morning. But during the day… I have trees. They don’t say much, but…
You hear them talk and they move.
Yes (laughs). Oh wait… I’ll show you something… Do you know what that is?
Yes, optic nerves.
Of course. They are the ones who let us see. Do you see how they are? They are like trees. They are like branches. In other words: we have trees in our eyes, right? Interesting.
Let me continue with your book. At one point, he says, this place has a helped calmness. Because when I was a kid it was a complete abyss…
Yeah yeah. But it was a coincidence. When I was 18 when I worked in a bank, they told me: You will take this money to a lady. I took the money and… I had the opportunity to escape. I gave the woman the money, huh. Do not think that I ran away with money (laughs). No. So: I had the opportunity to go to a quiet place, a lake, a forest, and there I started to think and write. I made my first book, they paid me 300 guilds, and it was successful when it came out because it was completely different from anything else back then. Philip and Others is a book. And I… I thought I had nothing more to say. It took me three years to write another fiction. Could he repeat this success? Maybe, but it didn’t. I thought that would happen with The Knight is Dead, but it didn’t matter that much. After All Souls’ Day was a success in America, and when it does, you’re having a good time.
And how is it in Spain?
Happy. One of the magics of this country is happiness.
He is a poet.
Yes, poetry is very important to me.
In the book, he says one of the most curious aspects of growing up is that there comes a time when almost everything evokes a memory.
If true. One is full of memories. I didn’t know my father very well, he died at 45, but my mother was 59 at 48, married to a man who lived his whole life with his mother, who was not used to children, and we were three. We sent them to a boarding school for Benedictine and Franciscan monks… So when I got an honorary doctorate in London, I talked to some students. I told them: you’re doing something I’ve never done: go to college. They all laughed and… I had to give a five-minute speech. They told me: five minutes, no more. You can talk for 20 minutes in Berlin, but not in London. Well, I just said this: I didn’t go to college.
It has a dialogue with the letter L. He chose two words, Read and Walk. Regarding reading, he says that peoples have two books: Quran and Bible. Then the people of one book declared war on the people of the other book. And he adds: “I have the impression that things haven’t changed much in the last 500 years.”
This is how it is. Today, our book, the Bible, commands us less. However, Muslims are still under the domination of the Qur’an. The result of that… you already know. Many are willing to die for what they think. It is that we are two worlds not going at the same speed. Complicated. But when they ask me this, as you do now, I say: Listen, I am not Jesus in the temple and I do not know everything and cannot answer everything.
Another phrase: “The garden is a portrait of the soul.”
A. Yes, yes. A little symbolic. I have ideas, I have a garden, and I try to harmonize both. As for Spain… You’d better not say anything, it’s Spanish. I better speak abroad: now I see the far right all over Europe. In the Netherlands, Germany, France… And look at Italy: they had Draghi, they were very smart and now there is an ultra lady who can come to power. Look: if the far right wins in Italy, it will be a problem for all of Europe. (Giorgia Meloni’s far-right won the elections).
He says the destination is the journey. It is surrounded by a beautiful garden. However, there are pointed cacti in some parts. Is this also part of destiny?
They are martyrs and soldiers (laughs). They, cacti, do not demand water, rain is enough for them. It hasn’t rained now and they are still there. They survived for years. They are the constants of the earth. And my life (laughs).
We went to the cactus garden, he has a favorite, the one who gives him flowers. These books, where you and nature come together… You are the Thoreau of the Mediterranean.
(Laughs) I read his books and he was a hero to live with. He lived in the woods for several years, and it’s incredible. But he had a mind that I didn’t have