Cees Nooteboom (born Cornelis Johannes Jacobus Maria Nooteboom, 31 July 1933, in the Hague) is a Dutch author. He has won numerous literary awards and has been mentioned as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in literature.
Nooteboom was born in the Hague, where his father was killed in a bombing in 1945. After his mother remarried in 1948, and thanks to his strict Catholic stepfather, Nooteboom attended several religious secondary schools, including a Franciscan school in Venray and a school run by the Augustinians in Eindhoven. He finished his secondary education at a nightschool in Utrecht.
After his first job with a bank in Hilversum, Nooteboom traveled throughout Europe. In addition to his writing, he has worked for the political weekly Elsevier from 1957—1960 and at the newspaper de Volkskrant from 1961-1968. In 1967, he became the travel editor for the magazine Avenue.
Nooteboom hired on as a sailor on a freighter to Surinam in 1957 in order to ask for the hand of his first wife, Fanny Lichtveld. They divorced in 1964. Some of his experiences are recounted in the book De verliefde gevangene (1958). He was also in a relationship with the singer, Liesbeth List. Currently he is married to Simone Sassen and divides his time between Amsterdam and the island of Minorca.
In addition to his many literature awards, Nooteboom was awarded honorary doctorates from Radboud University in Nijmegen in 2006 and the Free University of Berlin in 2008.
Nooteboom's first novel, Philip en de anderen (Philip and the Others, 1988), was published in 1955 and won the Anne Frank Prize. His second novel, De ridder is gestorven (The Knight Has Died, 1990), published in 1963, was to remain his last for 17 years. In 1980, his novel Rituelen (Rituals, 1983) brought him wide acclaim in Holland and won the Pegasus Prize. It was also his first translated into English. Other novels include Een lied van schijn en wezen (A Song of Truth and Semblance, 1984); Allerzielen (All Souls' Day, 2001) and Paradijs verloren (Paradise Lost, 2007). His best-known work to English-speaking audiences is perhaps Het volgende verhaal (The Following Story, 1994), which was written for the Dutch Boekenweek in 1991 and won him the Aristeion Prize in 1993.
Nooteboom is also a well-known travel writer. Some of his travel books include Een middag in Bruay, Een nacht in Tunesië, and De omweg naar Santiago (Roads to Santiago, 1997). His experiences living in Berlin are detailed in the book Berlijn 1989-2009, which is a collection of his earlier books Berlijnse notities and Terugkeer naar Berlijn and new material.
