Jan Wolkers’ Turkish Delight: a uneasy Dutch classic of sexual candour

On the school syllabus in the Netherlands, this explicit novel – that will offend some – reads wonderfully, but leaves uneasy questions about its treatment of women

It begins with an epigraph from Tintin, in which two villains argue over who is “wickeder”, then opens proper with an unnamed narrator masturbating over nude photos of his departed lover, Olga, and rereading her old letters: “While I’m writing this to you my cunt is making sucking motions, like a baby’s mouth,” reads one. This mixture of sexual candour, uncomfortable analogies and theatrical villainy sets the tone for Jan Wolkers’ Turkish Delight, a Dutch classic about a bohemian sculptor’s obsessive relationship – a new translation of which is about to be published by Tin House Books.

In the age of the internet, lines like “dry cunts with warts inside. Nasty to the touch but nice on the dick,” or “I LOVE YOU SO MUCH, DON’T WIPE YOUR ASS, I’LL LICK YOU CLEAN” may not seem so shocking (they certainly aren’t in the Netherlands, where Turkish Delight is on the school syllabus). There’s even a musical of it. Perhaps more surprising is that these sentiments weren’t that shocking to the Dutch in 1969, when the book was first published. This may be because the picaresque novel of sexual tall tales I, Jan Cremer – by the eponymous author – had already caused enough outrage in the Netherlands five years earlier.

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