Josephus Carel Franciscus (Jef) Last (2 May 1898 in
The Hague
The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a list of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's ad ...
– 15 February 1972 in
Laren) was a Dutch poet, writer, translator and cosmopolitan.
Jef Last was a writer and socially compassionate man. He had a
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...
background. However, he was very young member of the
SDAP and the "AJC". With these principles, he could not practice as an assistant manager of the
Enka
is a Japanese music genre considered to resemble traditional Japanese music stylistically. Modern ''enka'', however, is a relatively recent musical form, which adopts a more traditional musical style in its vocalism than '' ryūkōka'' music, ...
in
Ede, and eventually he resigned.
[Biografisch Woordenboek van het Socialisme en de Arbeidersbeweging in Nederland – Jef Last]
/ref>
He left the revisionist social democracy
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to prom ...
to become a member of Henk Sneevliet's Revolutionary Socialist Party. With his revolutionary friend André Gide
André Paul Guillaume Gide (; 22 November 1869 – 19 February 1951) was a French author and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature (in 1947). Gide's career ranged from its beginnings in the symbolist movement, to the advent of anticolonialism ...
, he traveled in the summer of 1936 to the Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
. The pair was well received, but saw through the organized tribute and returned to the west disillusioned. Much later Last wrote a book about his friendship with Gide.Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlism, Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebeli ...
in the International Brigades
The International Brigades ( es, Brigadas Internacionales) were military units set up by the Communist International to assist the Popular Front government of the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. The organization existed ...
, which was on the side of the Spanish Republic. As a result, he lost his Dutch citizenship because of military service for a foreign power. Shortly after the Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
, his citizenship was returned.Bali
Bali () is a province of Indonesia and the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands. East of Java and west of Lombok, the province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nu ...
), where he worked as a teacher at a secondary school. He was friends with president Sukarno
Sukarno). (; born Koesno Sosrodihardjo, ; 6 June 1901 – 21 June 1970) was an Indonesian statesman, orator, revolutionary, and nationalist who was the first president of Indonesia, serving from 1945 to 1967.
Sukarno was the leader ...
and Mohammad Hatta
Mohammad Hatta (; 12 August 1902 – 14 March 1980) was an Indonesian statesman and nationalist who served as the country's first vice president. Known as "The Proclamator", he and a number of Indonesians, including the first president of Indon ...
.
Family
He was married to Ida ter Haar from 1923, whom he divorced and later remarried. They had three daughters. Jef was bisexual. He was co-founder of the homosexual emancipation Shakespeare Club, the forerunner of the COC.
Work
*1926 – ''Bakboordslichten'' (poetry)
*1930 – ''Branding''
*1930 – ''Kameraden!'' (poetry)
*1930 – ''Marianne''
*1932 – ''Liefde in de portieken''
*1932 – ''Verleden tijd'' (poetry)
*1933 – ''Onder de koperen ploert''
*1933 – ''Partij remise''
*1933 – ''Twee werelden'' (poetry)
*1933 – ''De vlucht van den opstandeling''
*1934 – ''Zuiderzee''
*1935 – ''Een huis zonder vensters''
*1935 – ''Voor de mast''
*1936 – ''Brieven uit Spanje''
*1936 – ''De bevrijde Eros. Een ketter in moorenland en andere gedichten'' (poetry)
*1936 – ''Een flirt met den duivel''
*1937 – ''Bloedkoraal'' (poetry)
*1937 – ''In de loopgraven voor Madrid''
*1937 – ''De Spaansche tragedie'' (The Spanish tragedy
''The Spanish Tragedy, or Hieronimo is Mad Again'' is an Elizabethan tragedy written by Thomas Kyd between 1582 and 1592. Highly popular and influential in its time, ''The Spanish Tragedy'' established a new genre in English theatre, the reven ...
/ Spanish Front. Writers on the Civil War)
*1938 – ''De laatste waarheid''
*1939 – ''Kruisgang der jeugd''; with Harry Wilde
*1939 – ''De vliegende Hollander''
*1940 – ''Kinderen van de middernachtzon''
*1940 – ''Onvoldoende voor de liefde''
*1941 – ''Van een jongen die een man werd'' part I and II (youth work in 1919, at the time not published)
*1941 – ''Elfstedentocht''
*1942 – ''Leeghwater maalt de meren leeg''
*1944 – ''Tau Kho Tau'' (poetry)
*1945 – ''Een socialistische renaissance''
*1945 – ''Het eerste schip op de Newa'' ( The first ship up the Neva)
*1946 – ''Oog in oog'' (poetry)
*1947 – ''Vingers van de linkerhand''
*1949 – ''In de zevende hemel''
*1950 – ''Schuim op de kust''
*1951 – ''De rode en de witte lotus''
*1953 – ''Inleiding tot het denken van Confucius
Confucius ( ; zh, s=, p=Kǒng Fūzǐ, "Master Kǒng"; or commonly zh, s=, p=Kǒngzǐ, labels=no; – ) was a Chinese philosopher and politician of the Spring and Autumn period who is traditionally considered the paragon of Chinese sages. C ...
''
*1955 – ''Bali in de kentering''
*1956 – ''Zo zag ik Indonesië''
*1957 – ''Een lotje uit de loterij''
*1958 – ''I Bontot en I Koese. De avonturen van twee Balische jongens''; with Udeyana Pandji Tisna (The John Day Company
The John Day Company was a New York publishing firm that specialized in illustrated fiction and current affairs books and pamphlets from 1926 to 1968. It was founded by Richard J. Walsh in 1926 and named after John Day, the Elizabethan printer. W ...
)
*1959 – ''Lu Hsün. Dichter und Idol''
*1960 – ''Japan in kimono en overall''
*1960 – ''Tegen de draad'' (poetry)
*1960 – ''Vloog een bloesem terug naar haar tak''
*1962 – ''De Spaanse tragedie''
*1962 – ''Golven der Gele Rivier''
*1962 – ''De jeugd van Judas'' ( The boyhood of Judas; in: The fifth Acolyte Reader, Meppel 1991)
*1965 – ''China, land van de eeuwige omwenteling''
*1966 – ''De tweede dageraad van Japan''
*1966 – ''Mijn vriend André Gide''
*1967 – ''Rinus van der Lubbe, doodstraf voor een provo'' (edited reissue of ''Kruisgang der jeugd'')
*1968 – ''Strijd, handel en zeeroverij. De Hollandse tijd op Formosa''
*1970 – ''Vuurwerk achter de Chinese muur''
*1972 – ''Tjoebek in het tijgerbos'' (children's book)
*1973 – ''De zeven Caramboles''; under pseudonym Co Mantjens, second edition with subtitel: ''De postume pornoroman van Jef Last''
[only books with an English translation are linked]
References
External links
*
Jef Last.nl
{{DEFAULTSORT:Last, Jef
1898 births
1972 deaths
Writers from The Hague
Dutch male poets
Dutch LGBT rights activists
Bisexual men
Bisexual writers
Writers about the Soviet Union
Dutch LGBT writers
International Brigades personnel
20th-century Dutch poets
20th-century male writers