F.B. Hotz

F.B. Hotz (1922-2000) started to write in the early 1950s, but never dreamed he would ever be published. At that time he was a trombonist in a jazz combo. In the late 1950s he stopped making music, anxious to avoid becoming the oldest swinger in town. Hotz laboured for twenty years at improving his work yet remained deeply pessimistic. When finally, after much egging on by friends, he sent the story ‘De tramrace’ (The Tram Race) to a literary magazine, it caused a stir of excitement in the editorial team: never before had they seen such an accomplished debut. Twenty years later, in 1996, Hotz stopped publishing. ‘A writer has to know when to stop,’ was his reasoning. He was awarded the P.C. Hooft Prize, the most prestigious literary award in the Netherlands. In 1997, a beautiful boxed set was published under the title of Het werk (Complete Works). The two volumes include six collections of stories, a novella and the novel De vertekening (Distortion, 1991).