Portrait of Poet Jan Vos
by
Jan Lievens
.
Jan Jansz. Vos
(baptised 4 March 1612 in
Amsterdam
[1]
– buried 12 July 1667 in Amsterdam) was a Dutch playwright and poet. A glassmaker by trade (in that position he provided all windows for the
new city hall on the Dam
), he also played an important role as stage-manager and director of the theatre. He organized, on the mayors' orders, processions and splendid decorated
floats
, which sometimes drew disapproval, criticism, and derision.
Life
[
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]
On 20 February 1639, at the old City Hall of Amsterdam, he married Grietje Gerrets (1616 - 1651), already pregnant by him. They had two children: Jan (who only lived a few days) and Maria (who in 1664 laid the first stone for the new theatre). Jan Vos was of good family and lived in the
Kalverstraat
at no. 202. He prided himself on knowing no other languages than Dutch. With his
Aran and Titus
of 1641 his name, previously all but unknown, was made.
Casper van Baerle
admired the work, despite, or because, it featured a prince served as a pudding, a baked
Moor
and some apparitions. (The subject is the same as in Shakespeare's
Titus Andronicus
).
In his
Klucht van Oene
("The Farce of Oene", 1642), a number of dishonest practices by Amsterdam merchants and industrialists are criticized - bakers of bread short-selling their customers, tailors filching pieces of cloth owned by their patrons, glassmakers cheating with glass quantities, dyers of silk tampering with their material. In addition, house-agents, pawnbrokers, cashiers, notaries public and secretaries, landlords, millers, doctors, barbers, pharmacists and booksellers enter the stage.
Jan Vos was a sought-after table companion of such leading families as those of
De Graeff
,
Bicker
,
Joan Huydecoper van Maarsseveen
and
Jan Six
. He wrote
occasional poems
for them , and this has led to his often being characterized as "a family poet". One of his huge patrons was burgomaster
Andries de Graeff
.
[2]
In 1651 he was among the compilers of the
Verscheyde Nederduytse gedichten
("Sundry Poems in Dutch") collection of poems, an attempt to bring together painters and poets of different schools and religions. In 1657, he was an honoured guest at the marriage of Jan J. Hinlopen and Leonora Huydecoper.
Jan Vos was head of the
Theatre of Van Campen
for nineteen years, together with
Tobias van Domselaer
[
nl
]
and
Johannes Serwouters
[
nl
]
. Vos was part of the
Muiderkring
, a group of literary people meeting at a castle where the a member of the Bicker family had been appointed
"drost"
(keeper of the castle). He directed plays by
Vondel
.
Jan Vos had a good eye for the public taste, and was repeatedly entrusted by the city authorities with designing and overseeing pageants and spectacles. In 1654, Vos organized ten performances celebrating the
Treaty of Westminster
. In 1659, Amalia van Solms, the Regent's wife, and her daughter visited Amsterdam, seeing twenty performances especially designed for the occasions.
Nicolas Tulp
, however, vehemently opposed the appearance of pagan gods and goddesses during the visitors' festive arrival. At the visit of
Maria Henrietta Stuart
, the widow of
William II
, it turned out that one of the floats represented the beheading of
Charles I of England
, Mary's late father. Jan Vos, who led the processions on horseback, became a target for criticism.
Notes
[
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]
References
[
edit
]
- Dudok van Heel, S.A.C. (1980), "Jan Vos (1610 - 1667)." In: Jaarboek Amstelodamum, p. 23-43.
- Schwartz, G. (1987),
Rembrandt, zijn leven, zijn schilderijen. Een nieuwe biografie met alle beschikbare schilderijen in kleur afgebeeld
, p. 257-283.
External links
[
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]
Media related to
Jan Vos
at Wikimedia Commons
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