Father of the Dutch Literary Language: A posture analysis of P.C. Hooft

Abstract

In this thesis, I trace the ways in which seventeenth-century author P.C. Hooft represents himself as father of the Dutch literary language in his letters (auto-representation). From my research, it appears that he takes on three roles to construct his posture as father: a teacher of language, language purist, and an artist in literary Dutch. The second part of my research focuses on the extent to which this posture has been maintained in contemporary and later reception (hetero-representation). We will see that the roles of language purist and artist in literary Dutch are emphasised, and that the role of teacher disappears.