Douwes Dekker, Eduard (pseudonym: Multatuli)

writer

born: 02.03.1820 in Amsterdam

died: 19.02.1887 in Ingelheim am Rhein

After unsuccessfully attending a Latin school and training as a textile merchant, Douwes Dekker went to sea with his father. At the age of 18, he came to Java in the colony of the Dutch East Indies. In 1856, he was appointed "Assistant Resident" of Lebak in West Java. There he became an advocate for the disenfranchised and oppressed, whose fate he described in his novels. His career as a colonial official ended when he denounced the corrupt machinations of a local prince. He then returned to Europe in 1857.

Under the pseudonym Multatuli (Latin for "I have endured much"), he published the novel "Max Havelaar or The Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company" in Brussels in 1860. This unsparing exposure of colonial political grievances in Indonesia caused a sensation and is considered his best-known work. In the Netherlands, it is still an integral part of textbook literature today, as Dowes Dekker also created the modern orthography of the Dutch literary language.

He lived in Wiesbaden from 1870-79, then near Ingelheim. He regularly reported on his observations of Wiesbaden society and his experiences with gambling in "Million Studies" for the feature pages of Dutch daily newspapers.

In the Netherlands today, Multatuli is considered one of the country's most important writers. On the 100th anniversary of his death, he was commemorated in Ingelheim with a literary exhibition in the town hall. The International Multatuli Society was founded in the same year as part of a Multatuli symposium.

Schreeb, Hans Dieter: Millionenstudien - Multatuli und die Spielbank Wiesbaden, Wiesbaden 2004.