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| Louis Couperus - Bibliography|

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i) Couperus in English: an exploration

The nature of the rise and fall of ##Couperus's popularity in the Anglophone world is remarkable. #Eline Vere appeared in English translation (1892) just three years after its Dutch publication as a book proper. From then onwards, Couperus's works were translated only sporadically until 1915. Then a real translation boom happened: between 1916 and 1920 there appeared no less than fifteen English editions, followed by thirteen more in the next five years. Almost all of these were the work of one single translator: Alexander Teixeira de Mattos. The prominence of Louis Couperus in the English literary world has been described as follows:

The period 1915-1930 represents a clear peak in Couperus's popularity abroad [...]. Introduced in England in the 1890s by the famous man of letters Edmund Gosse, his work was later reviewed in popular journals and by influential critics such as Katherine Mansfield. At the pinnacle of his fame, he was put on a par with Thomas Mann, Conrad, Tolstoy, Galsworthy and other canonical writers. He was included in the Encyclopaedia Britannica (in 1922) and in standard works on literary criticism such as The Romantic Agony by Mario Praz (1930 [albeit only once and in a footnote]). When Couperus visisted London in 1921 he was received as a prominent author of European stature. [...] However, as sudden as it had started, in fact even more so, the interest abroad in Couperus disappeared. - Source (>link)

Several reasons for this collapse have been put forward. Once the poetics of the 'Nineties' movement, with its emphasis on naturalist and decadent topics, had gone out of fashion, Couperus was no longer relevant for the English reading public. Also, because of the economic recession, the overall sale of books suffered dramatically. This was even more the case for literature in translation.

Continue onto Part 2 (>link) (more bibliographical and filmographical information on Couperus in English and Dutch).

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