From October 20 to November 17, the Dutch will be reading one book together.

During a campaign called “The Netherlands Reads,” the Dutch government will be giving away 575,000 copies of the novel Dubbelspel by Frank Martinus Arion to library patrons. Based on the latest census, that’s about one book for every 28 persons. Readers are then encouraged to discuss the book with each other, effectively turning the nation into one big book club.

The campaign was inspired by “One Book” reading programs in the US, the first of which happened in Chicago in 2001 with Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. “One Book, One Chicago” made the well-loved classic a bestseller all over again and inspired cities in America and in Europe to launch their own city/nationwide reading programs.

Wouldn’t it be great if we had our own “One Book” campaign? Just imagine, Filipinos reading one book and talking about it. For once, maybe politics and personalities can take a backseat to a book. If you are someone who can do something like this (or if you know someone, please let them know) and if you think we can help, we’ll be glad to help.

About the book:
Dubbelspel (Double Play), was a bestseller back in 1973 by then first-time novelist Arion. Here is a description of the book taken from babelguides.com –

The title of Arion’s large and powerful Caribbean novel refers to an epic open-air game of dominoes, which lasts all afternoon and into the evening. Though it is ostensibly a relaxed and friendly occasion, underlying suspicions, jealousies and conflicts gradually surface. The game culminates in murder and suicide under the glare of public attention.

The two men on the winning team, Janchi and Chamon, are involved in adulterous relationships with the wives of their opponents, the host Bubu Fiel, a taxi-driver, and Manchi, a pompous bailiff. With great skill Arion reveals the past history and underlying motivations of the four players at the same time as creating a convincing atmosphere of heat and squalor and painting an affectionate but critical picture of Curaçao society.

The book is dedicated significantly to ‘women of courage’. In the novel it is Solema, who eventually leaves Manchi for Janchi Pau, who most clearly represents the courage, vision and energy required to emancipate the island from the colonial yoke and subservience to multinational oil companies. However, Bubu’s wife Nora, with her determination to secure an education at any cost for her bright son and constant desperate efforts to ward off impending financial disaster, exhibits her own, humbler kind of heroism.

The characters are stereotypes but effectively drawn and the explicit post-colonial political agenda (the Caribbean island of Curaçao is a Dutch dependency, and Dutch is still an official language there) does not detract from the liveliness of the action. The author’s deliberately formal style contrasts with the snatches of his native creole, Papiamento. It gives a unique flavour to the book, whose classical force the author has yet to surpass in any of its successors.