MARGA MINCO

B Y S H R E YA G U P TA

11 - C

R O L L N O . 2 7
 LIFE
Born on 31 March 1920, Ginneken, The Netherlands with the name Sara Menco, she was
the youngest child in an Orthodox Jewish Family
Minco began working as a trainee journalist on the Bredasche Courant in 1938.
In the autumn of 1942, she returned to Amsterdam and her parents, who were forced by
the German occupiers to move to the city’s Jewish Quarters.
As a young journalist she distanced herself from Orthodoxy and developed a sturdy
independence that helped her survive by passing, with her blue eyes and dyed-blonde hair,
as a Christian. She took the name Marga Faes.
She was the only member in her immediate family to survive
She married the poet Bert Voeten whom she
had met in 1938 and with whom she had hid
during the war.
After the war they worked on numerous
newspapers and magazines and Marga wrote
several award- winning books.
They had two daughters, one of whom is the
writer Jessica Voeten.
She celebrated her 100th birthday in March
2020.
 WRITING STYLE
If the war, the occupation, and the fate of the Dutch Jews are central thematically , her
tense, sober, and almost jerky language and syntax characterize her literary style. Her
novels consist of short, crisp, Hemingwayesque sentences
There are frequent flashbacks, which prevent any chronological linearity, and which keep
the reader in suspense and require care and concentration.
Existentialism imposes a certain tightness to her work. The main characters often survivors
of Holocaust, experience their lives as meaningless. Often, they have survived the war only
by a series of coincidences, while their loved ones have been murdered.For example, Freida
Borgstein in the “The Fall ”, manages by chance to survive the whole war without falling
into the hands of Nazis. Nevertheless, she dies at the age of 85 by falling accidentally into
an unprotected well.
 C R I T I C A L A N A LY S I S
Minco is one of The Netherland’s most popular writers. Almost everything she has written
Is marked by her experiences as a Jew during the German occupation. Her books reveal
not only what Dutch Jews faced once the Germans overran the country and what one was
forced to do in order to survive but also how a survivor needed to come to terms with the
past following liberation In April 1945.
Minco’s first book, Bitter Herbs, describes through the eyes of an adult sent how her
family , failing to see clearly an act resolutely against impending arrest and deportation, is
deported and never returns.
A second book, The Other Side was intended to show
that Minco could write on topics other than the recent
war , occupation, and persecution of the Dutch Jews.
it has the distinctly existentialist tone shown by much
European literature of the 1950s and, despite her
intention, contains material that pertains to the war
and to anti-Semitism.
A cub journalist at age 18 before the war, Minco was
destined to be a writer, and she has proven to be a
first-class author. Her works excel as literature and do
not depend on the Holocaust alone for their effect.
 L I T E R A RY A C H I E V E M E N T S
In 1957 she made her debut as a writer with Het bittere kruid (Bitter Herbs), the
devastating story of a young who escapes through the back door when her family is
arrested, and ultimately discovers that she has lost everyone close to her. The book was a
great success at home and abroad with over 400,000 copies sold in Netherlands alone.
New work followed at regular intervals De andere kant(The Other Side- 1959), Een leeg
huis(An Empty House-1966), De val(The Fall-1983), and De Glazen Brug(The Glass
Bridge- 1986)
In 2005, she was awarded the prestigious CONSTATIJN HUYGENS PRIZE for her
entire oeuvre.
In 2018 Marga won the P.C. HOOFT PRIZE, one of the most prestigious Dutch literary
awards.