Onafhankelijk magazine van Tilburg University

‘I donated that kidney
out of anarchy’
What drives successful people? That’s what Univers wants
to find out in the section passion, fear & faith. Tilburg graduate
Anton Dautzenberg’s national break-through was
with his novel Samaritaan (Samaritan), about the donation
of his kidney to a stranger.
At a table outside of café ‘Weemoed’ (Dutch for
‘Melancholy’), Anton Dautzenberg is giving his
interviews for the day. “Don’t believe everything he
says”, the person before me tells me as he leaves.
Dautzenberg revealed to him that the blessed
Tilburg priest Peerke Donders whispered in his ear that he had
to donate a kidney.
Dautzenberg and the truth: this has been an issue since the
writer from Tilburg and graduate of Tilburg University published
a series of fake interviews in a TV-guide. Dautzenberg pretended
to have interviewed front man Lemmy Kilmister of the metal
band Motörhead about the economic crisis. Lemmy compared
the crisis to a vagina, but the broadcasting company VPRO still
took the interviews deadly serious. And that while the editors
themselves had asked for an absurdistic approach. Dautzenberg
sees it as a compliment that they fell for it.
Now, his autobiographical novel Samaritaan is out (named after
the biblical ‘good Samaritan’), and everyone is wondering if
Dautzenberg actually donated a kidney to a complete stranger
just for kicks, like the main character.
Why do you write? “It’s difficult to answer that question. I think
that I want to channel the unrest. There’s a lot of unrest in my
mind. I don’t feel like I have anything to say.”
Really? Dautzenberg smiles. “You’re right, if you really don’t have
the idea that you have anything to say that other people would
like to hear, you wouldn’t publish. But publishing is not my first
goal. I like reading better than writing, even though writing is not
unpleasant. Would you like something to drink?”
Anton up until now
Anton Dautzenberg (1967) studied
Economics at Tilburg University
and later Language and Literature.
He worked for an environmental
consultancy company, but felt
extremely lonely due to his
extreme shyness. Later on, he
started a commercial text writing
company with a partner. Apart
from that, he is a writer and a
poet. He became well known in
Tilburg under the pseudonym Troy
Titane. He drew absurd cartoons,
Dautzenberg owns a commercial text writing company with a
partner. He doesn’t like artists who ‘revel in artistry’ but get nothing
done. He ‘works’ three or four days a week, in order to pay
his way as a literary writer. Because that’s what he loves to do.
You say: ‘That’s what I love to do’. That sounds different than
that you have to do it because of that ‘unrest’. “My heart lies
with literature, with music, with film. But apparently I can’t make
music and films. I regard music superior, because it’s more abstract.
I can be completely jealous of beautiful music. I recently
heard an experimental band in Pop Center 013. They played a
track that lasted an hour and in which they let go of all the rules
of metal music. At the end, most people had left the hall, but I
was deeply moved. I like it when people let go of the idiom.”
At the end of last year, Dautzenberg published a collection of
stories which even alarmed his own friends. In one story, a boy
receives a box with two boxing negroes in it. In another story, a
girl survives in the desert by drinking her father’s semen. His new
Samaritaan is the first novel ever to have been written completely
in dialogues, says Dautzenberg. They are conversations
about his kidney donation with doctors, friends, psychologists,
and even the kidney itself.
This letting go of rules, do you do that yourself in your
writing? “I try to, but in language you can never entirely escape
from the everyday meaning of language. I try to step outside of
the moral, go outside the box. I recognize a lot in surrealist films.
After I first saw Fellini’s Otte e mezzo, I didn’t speak for hours.
Maybe that’s because to me, life also isn’t linear. I play chess
wrote dark poems and satirical
columns, and was awarded the
title ‘night mayor of Tilburg’ for
his role in the nightlife and the
cultural life.
In 2010, he published a collection
of stories called Vogels met zwarte
poten kun je niet vreten (You can’t
devour birds with black feet)
under his own name. Last month,
his novel Samaritaan (Samaritan)
was published.
Passion, fear & faith .23
Univers 21 12 april mei 2011