Nederland Leest to campaign with Haasse’s Oeroeg

AMSTERDAM – The intense annual literacy campaign Nederland Leest (The Netherlands Reads) will republish the book Oeroeg for its Fall 2009 event. The 1948 fiction story by widely read author Hella S. Haasse is about two boys in the pre-WWII era. One boy is the son of a Dutch administrator who upon college graduation returns from the Netherlands, and the other is his Indonesian friend. The pair has gradually grown apart but after the separation to study abroad the estrangement appears to have widened into a gulf. A popular book, Oeroeg is now in its 47th printing. The 1948 edition was issued as a bonus book.