Prof. F.J.M. de Feijter (Anja)

Professor Anja de Feijter was professor of Modern Dutch Literature from 1995 untill 2021. She taught theory and analysis of poetry, literary theory and twentieth century literary history. She is inspired by the theory of Roman Jakobson (1896-1982) who defined poetry as the use of language wherein the word is felt as a word and directs attention to or focus on itself. Language thus acquires a certain autonomy resulting in a proces of production of meaning or significance. It is very well possible to connect the insights of Jakobson with those of the Dutch poet Martinus Nijhoff (1894-1953) who spoke of words that sing and swing away of their meanings. Professor De Feijter is regarded as a connoisseur of the poetry of the Dutch poet Lucebert (1924-1994), central figure of the postwar Movement of the Fifties. She investigated the spectacularly deviant, ungrammatical or ‘atonal’ form of his poems in her dissertation «apocrief / de analphabetische naam». Het historisch debuut van Lucebert in het licht van de intertekst van Joodse mystiek en Hölderlin (Amsterdam: De Bezige Bij, 1994). Since retirement her research is directed towards the edition of unpublished early work of Lucebert.