HENDRIK

JAN

See also:

• HENDRIK JAN SCHIMMEL (1825– )

SCHIMMEL (1825– )  , Dutch poet and novelist, was born on the 3oth of June 1825, at 'S Graveland, in the province of North Holland, where his father was a notary and the burgomaster . From 1836 to 1842 Schimmel served in his father's office, and upon his death he was taken into the office of the agent of the Dutch Treasury in Amsterdam, ex-changing in 1849 for a post with the Dutch Trading Company there . In 1863 he became a director of the Amsterdam Credit Association . His first volume of poems appeared in 1852; but it was as a writer of historical dramas in blank verse and one of the regenerators of the Dutch stage that his literary position was made . His finest production was Struensee (1868), which was preceded by Napoleon Bonaparte (1851) and Juffrouw Serklaas (" Mrs Serklaas," 1857) . Among his other dramatic works may be mentioned Joan Woutersz (a drama, 1847), Twee Tudors (" Two Tudors," 1847), Gondelbald (1848), Schuld en Boete (" Guilt and Retribution," a drama, 1852), Het Kind van Staat (" The State Child," a dramatic fragment, 1859); Zege na Str:7d (" Struggle and Triumph," a drama, 1878) . Schimmel's renderings of Casimir de la Vigne's Louis XI., Geibel's Sophonisbe, and Ponsard's Lucrece are also still acted in the Netherlands . His novels are distinguished by their 'vigorous style and able characterization . The earlier, better-known ones betray the writer's English proclivities . The plots of Mary Hollis (186o, 3 vols., English translation, London 1872, under the title of " Mary Hollis, a Romance of the Days of Charles II. and William, Prince of Orange," 3 vols.) and of Mylady Carlisle (1864, 4 vols.) are laid in England, whereas those of his Sinjeur Semeyns (1875, 3 vols.), a powerful picture of the terrible year 1672, and of De Kapitein van de Lijfgarde (1888, 3 vols., English adaptation, 1896, under the title of " The Lifeguardsman," t vol.), a continuation of '" Master Semeyns," are almost entirely centred in Holland . He had many points of style and manner in common with Madame Bosboom-Toussaint, though both remained highly original in their treatment . Both finally reverted to essentially national subjects .

To the earlier romances of Schimmel belong: Bonaparte en zyn Tyd (" Bonaparte and his

Time," 1853), De Eerste Dag eens Nieuwen Levens (" The First Day of a New Life," 2 vols., 1855), Sproken en Vertellingen (" Legends and Tales," 1855), Een Haagsche Joffer (" A Hague Damsel," 1857), De Vooravond der Revolutie (" The Eve of the Revolution," 1866) . Schimmel was an early collaborator of Potgieter on the Gids staff . His dramatic works appeared in a collected edition in 1885—1886 at Amsterdam (3 vols.), followed by a complete and popular issue of his novels (Schiedam, 1892) .