José Rentes de Carvalho
Autor de Waar die andere God woont
Sobre El Autor
Obras de José Rentes de Carvalho
Ernestina 3 copias
O Meças 1 copia
Com os Holandeses 1 copia
Montedor 1 copia
Portugal - A Flor e a Foice 1 copia
Pó,cinza e recordações 1 copia
noordnederlandse verhalen 1 copia
A ira de Deus sobre a Europa 1 copia
A sétima onda 1 copia
Trás os Montes, o Nordeste 1 copia
Com os Holandeses 1 copia
O joalheiro 1 copia
Obras relacionadas
Etiquetado
Conocimiento común
- Nombre canónico
- Rentes de Carvalho, José
- Fecha de nacimiento
- 1930
- Género
- male
- Nacionalidad
- Portugal
Miembros
Reseñas
Premios
También Puede Gustarte
Autores relacionados
Estadísticas
- Obras
- 38
- También por
- 1
- Miembros
- 299
- Popularidad
- #78,483
- Valoración
- 4.1
- Reseñas
- 9
- ISBNs
- 51
- Idiomas
- 2
- Favorito
- 1
This book is partly a look at Dutch life as he has experienced it over the long period he has been here, but it's mostly a kind of self-diagnosis to work out what the condition of being a long-term expat does to the way you see the world. He traces his experience through the familiar stages that start with amused contempt for the strange customs of the host country (especially those surrounding food and drink, hospitality, and sex — all of them very bizarre to a Southern European), progress to a deepening understanding of and admiration for the social and political values that the Dutch pride themselves on, and then eventually descend into a pessimistic awareness that Dutch citizens and their political leaders are just as subject to self-interest, mediocrity, indecisiveness and hypocrisy as everyone else in the world.
Of course, when he's dealing with such a long period of time, Rentes also has to allow for the enormous changes that have taken place in the Netherlands in the period that he's been living here, from a small and very provincial place recovering from the blows of the war to a relatively rich country that sees itself as a global force in politics and business, but which is struggling with the social changes resulting from mass immigration. Rentes looks at some of the big events in that story — Pim Fortuyn, Theo Van Gogh, Ayaan Hirsi Ali — and comes to depressing conclusions about the country's future. Possibly he doesn't allow sufficiently for the other thing that affects most long-term expats: age-related pessimism. As we all know, it's not just our host country that is going down the drain, but our country of origin (all long-term expats will agree that, whichever country they came from, that country is now governed by a bunch of corrupt baboons) and everywhere else too.
Given that I arrived in the Netherlands at the same age as Rentes (but some years later), and have also stuck here for unclear reasons, I found this quite a fascinating read. Ask me in about 25 years if I agree with him...… (más)