Poet Marga Kool, who grew up in Linde, near Zuidwolde, comes up with a new poetry collection called ‘For my sweet walker’ 17 years after her novel ‘A small world’, and it is not quite what we are used to.
Because Kool thinks that it can be difficult to attract a larger audience with a Drenthe collection. “Short sentences make it readable for non-Drens speakers, but it is still a more limited circuit,” she explains. “That’s difficult if you want to compete with other Dutch-speaking poets.” And with that, Kool makes himself vulnerable. “Because I want to know whether my work can stand the test of criticism if it is not linked to some kind of Drenthe movement.”
The collection ‘For my dear walker’ consists of a combination of new poems, older poems and poems translated from Drenthe. In the collection, life is described as a walk. “Not just a walk through landscape or time, but also through my work.”
She does not yet know what the reactions to the collection will be. “It has only been out for a very short time, but I am looking forward to the new reviews with great anticipation.”
The new step in Kool’s poet and writer life certainly comes at a time when new things come her way. Book readers saw nothing new from her for 17 years, but she was not dry. Together with composer Gezinus Veldman, she started working on a genre that was new to her. “I have now written three music stories and the audience has been able to enjoy them, because they have also been performed,” she says in Cassata. A music story consists of texts by Kool in combination with music by Veldman performed by male choirs, project choirs and soloists, among others.
Such a new genre also brings tension. “It’s new to me. I’ve always performed without music and it’s always exciting whether you arrive at the right time,” she says. But nerves are not new for Kool. “I actually have that at every performance and every reading. But that disappears as soon as I have said a few words. If you notice that the audience is interested and that it does something to them, I am in my element.”
Watch below how Marga Kool recites a poem from her collection.