In the Dutch East Indies she sympathised with the Indies independence movement and befriended Indonesian intellectual Sutan Sjahrir via their common friend the famous author E. du Perron. During WWII she was captive in a Japanese concentration camp. An account of these years named 'Kampdagboeken' was the last book she ever published in 1989.
Vuijk is considered a brilliant literary composer and won numerous awards throughout her career, among them the 1973 Constantijn Huygens Prize. Much of her literary work is auto-biographical and clearly pinpoints the racial relationships in the colonial Dutch East Indies and the paradoxes of the early post-colonial and revolutionary years.
One of her critically acclaimed books is ‘Laatste huis van de wereld’ (Last house in the world), 1939, about intense adventure in primitive circumstances, but also fearful hardship in the pre-WWII Indies.[1] The book was inspired by her own experiences living in the South Moluccas and is sometimes compared to the writings of the great female Indo author Maria Dermoût, who also lived in the Moluccas. Vuijk herself was quite outspoken about what she considered a clear distinction between her own rugged experience and the more elite experience of Dermoût.[2]
”Much more than Maria Dermoût I have lived in the middle of the indigenous world. Amidst the local population. We even ran with crooks, thugs and the most primitive of groups of the population on Buru. I take my own personal place in Dutch literature. After all, I am the only Indo author who does not write out of nostalgia.” Beb Vuijk, 1990.
In her 1947 book ‘De wilde groene geur’ (The wild green scent) she sharply describes the revolutionary period following the end of WWII with a keen eye for the different (Dutch, Indo and Indonesian) perspectives. Having been brought up in the Netherlands she had often experienced racial bigotry in her childhood because of the darker complexion of her skin. She had developed a fighting spirit and could easily identify with the Indonesian independence movement. Vuijk befriended Indonesian intellectual and independence leader Sutan Sjahrir and originally chose Indonesian citizenship before eventually returning to the Netherlands in 1957, due to strong anti-Dutch sentiments that prevailed in the period.[3]
"Nowhere in Dutch literature, the dramatic transition of the Dutch East Indies to independent Indonesia is described as penetrating as in the work of the Delfshaven (Rotterdam) born Vuyk. With evocations of the colonial system and its aftermath in three novels and the first years of the new republic in later novels, she recorded an episode, which remains among the most radical in the history of her motherland and it's colony." J.H.W. Veenstra.
Back in the Netherlands Vuijk gained national fame by publishing the hugely popular cookbook ‘Groot Indonesische kookboek’ (Great Indonesian cookbook) in 1979. 30 years and 125.000 copies later the book was still popular and was added to the ‘Culinary Classics’ series.
Publications
- 1932 - Vele namen
- 1937 - Duizend eilanden
- 1939 - Het laatste huis van de wereld
- 1947 - De wilde groene geur
- 1947 - Het hout van Bara
- 1959 - Gerucht en geweld
- 1969 - De eigen wereld en die andere
- 1971 - Een broer in Brazilië (second edition in 1982)
- 1972 - Verzameld werk
- 1973 - Groot Indonesisch kookboek
- 1982 - Vegetarische recepten uit de Indonesische keuken
- 1983 - Reis naar het Vaderland in de verte (travel stories)
- 1989 - Kampdagboeken (Camp diaries)
- Nieuwenhuys, Rob ‘Oost-Indische spiegel. Wat Nederlandse schrijvers en dichters over Indonesië hebben geschreven vanaf de eerste jaren der Compagnie tot op heden.’ (Querido's Publishers, Amsterdam, 1978)
- Scova Righini, Bert, ‘Een leven in twee vaderlanden - Een biografie van Beb Vuijk’ (KITLV, 2006) ISBN 90 6718 259 [2]
- ^ Even the great E. du perron enthusiastically endorsed the book, making Vuijk a household name in the literary circles of the Dutch East Indies.
- ^ Nieuwenhuys, Rob ‘Oost-Indische spiegel. Wat Nederlandse schrijvers en dichters over Indonesië hebben geschreven vanaf de eerste jaren der Compagnie tot op heden.’ (Querido's Publishers, Amsterdam, 1978) P.478-480
- ^ Nieuwenhuys, Rob ‘Oost-Indische spiegel. Wat Nederlandse schrijvers en dichters over Indonesië hebben geschreven vanaf de eerste jaren der Compagnie tot op heden.’ (Querido's Publishers, Amsterdam, 1978) P.482-486