Outside and inside

Rosa Knorringa

In the collection Buiten en Binnen we meet poet Rosa Knorringa (1932). She was 20 when, shocked by the flood disaster, she wrote On Dry Ground . Rosa's foster mother, actress Nell Knoop, recited it in a radio broadcast. There were many appreciative reactions and the poem appeared in various magazines. De Gids asked Rosa for more work and published several poems.

The poems immediately have a mature tone, with a consistent rhythm and rhyme. They breathe the time in which they were written. Gradually we see Rosa's poetry become freer in style, and also a bit lighter, but there is always a lot of attention for rhythm and melody. There is not one dominant theme. We read reflections on the human condition and intimate, small-scale observations. Everything could become a poem.