Talking about poetry for children

This year (March 2017) the very first Versfest was organized in Berlin: a festival about poetry for children. I was so lucky to be asked as one of the poets. A part of the festival is the Voices-project: writers and poets talk about their profession. Below you can hear the answers I had to come up with, answers to some pretty difficult questions.
By the way: the book I'm referring to can be found here.

New picture book announced

A new book about Vasco the Soccer Pig will find its way out into the world. In a few months this new picture book with the great and awesome Alain Verster will be published (by De Eenhoorn in Belgium). It's gonna be VASCO AND THE GREEN MONSTER and contains the story of how Vasco one day hoped to play soccer with his human mate Matteo (because they do so every day), but suddenly Matteo says he will be getting a new 'present' to play with - and this present is called John.
Vasco's head fills itself with jealousy and fear - will he be replaced by John, the Green Monster?

In 2011 Alain Verster debuted with my story THE DOVE THAT COULDN'T DIVE. The book was sold to six countries and received four awards. Our second collaboration was the 2013 VASCO THE LITTLE SOCCER PIG, which is also available in Chinese and Brazilian Portuguese and was nominated for the Boekenpauw, the highest Flemish illustration prize. VASCO AND THE GREEN MONSTER, which is to be read separately, is our third book together.

Honorary Mention 2017

At the annual children's books award ceremony our book IK BEN BIJ DE DINOSAURUSSEN GEWEEST (I WAS WITH THE DINOSAURS) got an Honorary Mention for the text (in Dutch: Vlag en Wimpel). This is a very nice reward (thank you, jury!) for the effort that was put into this book. The book was written for illustrator Floor de Goede, who used to be a 'dinosaur-kid'. He outdid himself, and I'm glad the book will get some more attention now. The picture book, which was published by Querido, Amsterdam, was already chosen amongst the ten books for the picture book days. It describes how a young boy wants to emerge himself in the dinosaur's world, by reading about it in his favorite book. But then his parents call him... The book, with ample text, is an ode to the colourful imagination children spin (and to the dinosaurs of course!).

The book has also been published in Denmark, by Turbine Forlag, and rights for other languages can be discussed here.

Danish tigers

The second book that I got to make with the awesome Ingrid & Dieter Schubert was called WIJ ZIJN TIJGERS! (WE ARE TIGERS!). This picture book is now starting to travel: after a previous sale of rights to Germany (Fischer Sauerländer) recently also the Danes have bought it. It will be published at Turbine Forlag. The original book came out at Querido.

An earlier book that the Schuberts and I made together, OPVROLIJKVOGELTJE (CHEER UP BIRD) was sold to Germany, Italy, the United States and Turkey. That book came out at Lemniscaat.

Even more poetry in the United States

And again some wonderful translation news. David Colmer is also working on the English translation of the poems from my volume I'M CHEERING FOR YOU - poems that are about animals and sports, written to the images made by Wolf Erlbruch.

The publishing house of Eerdmans, that also did THE DOG THAT NINO DIDN'T HAVE (with Anton Van Hertbruggen) and the consecutive books about the dog Sam (with Philip Hopman), will now publish I'M CHEERING FOR YOU. That is marvelous news. So, a big thank you to Eerdmans, to rights manager Luciënne van der Leije (of the original publisher Querido), and to David Colmer!

I'M CHEERING FOR YOU was awarded with the bi-annual Golden Poetry Medal for children's poetry and received an Honorary Mention at the Dutch Children's Book Prizes.

Sam à la France

More nice news: my book DE RAADSELS VAN SAM (SAMS MYSTERIES) will be translated into French. Last year the first book about the beautiful and mysterious white dog Sam came out in France, at L'école des loisirs. It was translated by Maurice Lomré. It was called LE CHOIX DE SAM.
Of course the stunning illustrations by Philip Hopman will be used, also for this second book.

The first book has been sold to more than 13 languagues, and the second book will now be available in English (this April, at Eerdmans USA), German, Estonian and French.
More information on the rights can be found here.

Poetry in the United States

It's not that often poetry gets translated - and certainly not in English. But master translator David Colmer is working on it right now: an English translation selection of poems taken from my two volumes AANHALINGSTEKENS (QUOTATION MARKS) and CHATBOX, that will be published by the small, vibrant American publishing house of A Midsummer Night's Press (directed by Lawrence Schimel). The publishing date will be somewhere this year.
These both books were originally issued by Querido, Amsterdam.

A huge thank you to both Lawrence Schimel and David Colmer.