You Have Me to Love

By Jaap Robben and David Doherty

"You Have Me to Love is an intense and dramatic novel filled with meticulous use of detail and a forensic psychological accuracy. Its power comes from the fierce energy of the narrative structure, the way of handling silence and pain, and the ability to confront the darkest areas of experience with clear-eyed sympathy and care. Jaap Robben handles delicate, dangerous material with subtlety and sympathy, but also with a visionary sense of truth that is masterly and unforgettable." —Colm Tóibín, author of House of Names and Brooklyn

Mikael lives with his parents on an island somewhere between Scotland and Norway. One day Mikael’s father saves him from drowning in the ocean, but is himself thrown against the rocks by a wave and disappears under water. In shock and unable to speak, Mikael blocks out the memory of what took place, silently joining his mother in the search for his missing father. As Mikael’s mother realizes her husband has drowned, the relationship between her and Mikael transforms: she slowly starts to unravel, forcing the son to replace his father in every possible way.

• Language: English
• Publisher: World Editions
• Release date: Sep 4, 2018
• ISBN: 9781642860214

Book preview

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BOLD, TENDER AND DISTURBING

On a remote island somewhere in the North Atlantic, a nine-year-old boy looks on helplessly as his father is swept out to sea. Consumed by guilt and paralyzed by his mother’s frantic grief, Mikael cannot bring himself to tell the truth about what happened. As the pair struggle to restore the fragile balance of their isolated lives, the young widow starts to demand the impossible of her only son.

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Praise for You Have Me to Love

‘Jaap Robben handles delicate, dangerous material with subtlety and sympathy, but also with a visionary sense of truth that is masterly and unforgettable.’

COLM TÓIBÍN

‘In this tremendous book, Robben explores isolation, guilt, mother- and childhood in the most unexpected way. Robben’s crystal clear sentences combined with his deep gaze into the flipsides of human behavior – and love – make this an unforgettable read. Run to the bookstores, people’

DORTHE NORS

‘An overwhelming debut about lost childhood innocence, You Have Me to Love can be favourably compared to Niccolò Ammaniti’s I’m Not Scared and Ian McEwan’s The Cement Garden. A staggering first novel: faultless in its description of a child’s inner world’

Het Parool

‘What a beautiful writer Robben is! I read the novel and was completely seduced – raw and harrowing and very moving. Robben is a powerful writer and reminds me very much of Per Petterson’

AIFRIC CAMPBELL

‘This is a bold, tender and ambivalent narrative, raw and disturbing, with moments of painful beauty: a taut narrative heavy with a convincing sense of dread’

Irish Times

‘Robben lifts you from your life and sweeps you away, with no chance of escaping. You just keep reading while you’re holding your breath. A promising novelist is born’

De Morgen

‘A gripping novel that steadily tightens its hold’

De Volkskrant

‘You Have Me to Love is a beautiful, intoxicating book full of magnificent sentences and terrific empathy’

Boekblad

‘Beautiful, just beautiful’

GERBRAND BAKKER

‘Lucid and unjudgemental, this a universal story of isolation, loneliness and tragedy. Like a record stuck in its groove, it won’t let me go’

EUROPEAN LITERATURE NETWORK

‘A small masterpiece’

Harpers Bazaar

‘Mixes the sinister with the beautiful to create something truly unique’

Blackwell’s Book Shop

‘From the very first sentence it is clear how well début novelist Jaap Robben writes. His childishly simple yet highly suggestive sentences make You Have Me to Love as stark and foreboding as the island on which it is set’

NRC Next

‘Unbelievable. A beautiful story, light for all its heaviness, written in a clear and powerful style. Robben merges grief, simplicity and isolation in a phenomenal way’

Telegraaf

‘Robben’s clear sentences and empathic use of language read like poetry: rhythmic, probing, and sonorous’

Dagblad van het Noorden

‘A beautiful novel about grief, remorse and loneliness, which excels in its level of sophistication’

Algemeen Dagblad

‘Robben shows in a sober, visual, poetic style how mother and son keep each other prisoner, unable to live either with or without each other’

Nederlands Dagblad

‘Robben is a wizard with the written word. On every page you come across sentences of no more than six or seven words that transform in your head into succinct, artful, razor-sharp films. You Have Me to Love is a true joy to read’

Boek

‘Robben’s prose is beautiful and expressive’

Hotel Boekenlust

‘In restrained and austere language, it pierces your heart directly to its core’

ZiN Magazine

‘Robben has just written himself straight into literary history’

Boekenredactie Bol.com

‘Magnificent, poetic, lonely, gruesome. And also beautifully written’

Kunststof Radio 1

‘You have those books that you can’t put down, but that you also want to savour for as long as possible because otherwise they are over too soon. You Have Me to Love by Jaap Robben is one of those books’

Boekenbijlage.nl

‘A debut that blew me away and deserves to be read by a large audience’

Boekreviews

‘You Have Me to Love to Love is an experience. The intense dialogues, potent atmospheric descriptions and near-poetic imagery make this a magnificent and powerful story that gets under your skin’

Cutting Edge

‘Wow! Not only can Jaap Robben write beautiful sentences, he also knows how to pull the punches with a fascinating story about stifling love. A literary gem’

Wegener Dagbladen

‘The accuracy with which Jaap Robben observes things – a skill which also shines in his best poems – almost hypnotizes’

Leeswolf

‘A hard and confrontational book, yet at the same time one of exceptional beauty’

Na de Lunch

‘A moving novel. Jaap Robben writes, with a clear andcontrolled pen, a story brimming with beautiful imagery’

Dutch Glory

‘A heart-breakingly beautiful book’

MAUD VANHAUWAERT

‘A direct hit’

MARCEL ROZER, De Gelderlander

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JAAP ROBBEN (1984) is a poet, playwright, performer and acclaimed children’s author. You Have Me to Love, his first novel for adults, has received international glowing reviews and is the winner of the 2014 Dutch Booksellers Award, the Dioraphte Prize, and the ANV Award for best Dutch debut. To date, the novel has sold over 50,000 copies in the Netherlands and is available in ten languages. You Have Me to Love is currently being adapted into an English-language film.

DAVID DOHERTY studied English and literary linguistics in Glasgow before moving to Amsterdam, where he has been working as a translator since 1996. His translations include novels by critically acclaimed Dutch-language authors: The Dutch Maiden by Marente de Moor (long-listed for the Warwick Translation Prize 2017), Monte Carlo by Peter Terrin, and The Dyslexic Hearts Club by Hanneke Hendrix. He has also translated the work of leading Dutch sports writers Hugo Borst and Wilfried de Jong. David was recently commended by the jury of the Vondel Translation Prize for his translations of The Dutch Maiden and You Have Me to Love.

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AUTHOR

‘One day a woman in an old-people’s home lay her hand on my knee and said, do you know you have really beautiful legs? I said, no, but thank you very much. Then she asked, do you have a girlfriend? When I answered yes, she quickly took her hand away. That incident made me think: what if that old woman was your mother, who mistook you for your father, and began to fall in love with you? Under what circumstances could you maybe go along with that?’

TRANSLATOR

‘Translating this novel was a huge responsibility, as I began to weigh my own words against Robben’s tender and poetic account of a disturbing family tragedy told through the eyes of the only child. Above all else, I knew that every word I put into this young boy's mouth had to ring true. So when the Irish Times review spoke of an extraordinary narrator who is to be believed, I couldn't have been happier. Mikael had made it into English with his voice intact.’

PUBLISHER

‘This novel is one of my personal favorites. Jaap Robben has an incredibly fine eye for detail and images. The story he tells is discomforting and moving at the same time. This beautifully crafted debut novel made me absolutely fall in love with Robben, even before seeing his legs.’

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JAAP ROBBEN

You Have Me to Love

Translated from the Dutch

by David Doherty

WORLD EDITIONS

New York, London, Amsterdam

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Published in the USA in 2018 by World Editions LLC, New York

Published in the UK in 2016 by World Editions LTD, London

World Editions

New York/London/Amsterdam

Copyright © Jaap Robben, 2014

English translation copyright © David Doherty, 2016

Cover image © Teun Hocks

Author’s portrait © Charlie De Keersmaecker

This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data is available.

ISBN Trade paperback 978-1-64286-001-6

ISBN E-book 978-1-64286-021-4

First published as Birk in the Netherlands in 2014 by De Geus BV.

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained herein.

This book was published with the support of the Dutch Foundation for Literature

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Twitter: @WorldEdBooks

Facebook: WorldEditionsInternationalPublishing

www.worldeditions.org

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For Patrick

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Many thanks to Ad, Sander, Thijs, Marieke, the World Editions and the De Geus family. To Passa Porta for providing me with a pleasant and quiet place to work at the right moment. To Henk for hoppakee, the word that hung above my computer and kept me going. To my loving parents, Sylvia and Gerard, for unfailing support and pots of soup. To David, for his loving translation. And thanks to my own sweet Suus, without whom this book would never have seen the light of day.

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I

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1

My tongue felt like it was crawling with ants. My feet were heavy. I was standing at the back door in my swimming trunks, towel around my neck. Mum had come into the kitchen, but she hadn’t looked at me yet. ‘There you are,’ she said without raising her head as she lifted the lid off the pot. She ladled my bowl full of soup, then hers.

She dipped a finger into my soup and stirred. ‘Just right. Tuck in.’ I sat down on my chair and stared at the steam rising sluggishly from my bowl. ‘Don’t leave too much for Dad. If he’d wanted a decent helping, he should’ve been back on time.’ Spooning soup into her mouth, she returned to her sewing machine in the living room. ‘Just finishing this off. Won’t be long.’

My hands lay motionless on the table. Inside they were shaking. I could hear the scraping of gulls sharpening their beaks on the gutter above the window. I knew I should be eating my soup, but it was all I could do to take hold of the spoon.

I took a gulp of water from my glass. It felt like I was choking. I gagged and a little of what I sicked up disappeared into my soup. I wiped away what had landed next to the bowl with a furtive sweep of my hand. Mum hadn’t noticed. She was leaning forward in her chair, staring intently at the rattling needle of her sewing machine, only letting up to see if she was still going in a straight line.

After a few minutes, Mum came back into the kitchen to fetch the Worcester sauce from the spice rack. She rested her hips against the sink and leaned toward the window.

‘Taking his own sweet time again.’ My heart wanted to leap out of my chest. I stuck the empty spoon in my mouth. ‘Don’t take after your father,’ she smiled. ‘You can never count on a man like that.’ Before I could answer, the sewing machine had started rattling again.

The harder I bit down on my tongue, the more the ants prickled. Dusk made a mirror of the window. I knew it held my reflection, but I couldn’t bring myself to look. Mum went over to the bin, trod on the pedal, and let a few scraps of material fall from her hand.

‘Aren’t you going to eat anything?’

I gave a jerky shrug.

‘Nothing to say for yourself?’

‘I’ve had enough,’ I said.

‘Well, that wasn’t much.’

‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t come crying like a baby that you want something else later.’ She tipped my soup back into the pot, placed my bowl next to hers by the sink, and left the pot and one bowl on the table for Dad. She caught me looking at them. ‘That father of yours can heat up his own soup.’ When she called him ‘that father of yours’, it meant he’d done something he needed to make up for. She rubbed dark-brown stripes across the table with a damp cloth.

‘He swam away.’ The words stumbled out of my mouth.

‘Hmm?’

‘Dad swam away.’

‘Swam away?’

‘Yes.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘Dunno.’

She looked at me, puzzled. ‘Where to?’

I shrugged.

‘Didn’t he tell you?’

Again, I shrugged.

‘But you must know if he said something.’

‘I don’t think he said anything.’

She cupped her hands around her eyes and put her face to the window.

‘Did you two have a row?’

‘No.’

She tossed her head as if to shake loose a couple of strange thoughts.

‘That waster does whatever he likes.’ She turned the tap on full, put the plug in the sink, and squirted in some washing-up liquid. I heard the muffled clunk of plates and mugs, the scrape of knives, forks, and spoons. The boiler hummed away in the cupboard below.

At the slightest sound, Mum looked up and turned her head toward the front door, though they were only the noises the house makes. When she was finished, she draped a tea towel over the clean dishes on the draining board.

‘He was underwater.’

‘What?’

‘All of a sudden.’

‘What was all of a sudden?’

I shrugged.

‘Stop shrugging your shoulders every time I ask you a question.’

‘He wanted to climb out of the water after me.’

‘Did you two go swimming?’

‘No.’

‘You knew that wasn’t allowed.’

I shook my head.

‘What happened? Tell me.’

‘I looked round and all of a sudden Dad was swimming underwater.’

‘Underwater? Just like that?’

I tried my best not to shrug, but I couldn’t help myself.

‘He must have said something?’

‘Dunno.’

‘Well, where did he go?’

‘I don’t know that, either.’

‘Dunno, dunno, dunno… Where was he heading?’

‘I couldn’t see.’

‘But you just said he climbed out of the water after you.’

‘Didn’t.’

‘What do you mean, didn’t?’

‘I didn’t go for a swim.’

Her hand shot out and felt at my swimming trunks. ‘Are you telling me lies?’

My head wouldn’t stop shaking.

‘Where were you?’

‘On the sand.’

‘And that’s where he went swimming?’

I shook my head. ‘Over by the rocks.’

She looked deep into my eyes. Then she rushed into the hall, yanked open the dresser drawer, and took out a torch. She flashed it on and off three times and went outside. By the time the light on the outside wall flickered on, she had disappeared round the side of the house. Quick as I could, I pulled one of Dad’s jumpers from the drying rack and put it on. It was way too big for me. I wormed my feet into my boots and had to run to keep up with her.

2

The red light of a buoy appeared in the distant dusk. We scrambled down the path to the beach, curled like a half-moon around the cove. I kept trying to take hold of Mum’s hand, but she was walking too fast.

Dad’s sunglasses, his towel, and our flip-flops lay waiting on the sand, but not where we’d left them. I felt a surge of relief. Dad must have climbed out of the water and moved our things further from the breaking waves. Seconds later, my legs turned weak and wobbly again as I realized the tide had gone out.

Mum shoved the torch into my hands and turned over the things on the sand, as if he might be hiding under them. ‘Birk!’ she shouted across the water. ‘Where are you?’

When no answer came, she turned to me. I accidentally shone the light in her face.

‘Where did you see him last?’

I pointed the torch at the rocks.

‘There?’

I was close to tears.

‘Are you sure?’ She didn’t see me nod. She was staring out to sea again. ‘Birk!’ she shouted. ‘Birk!’

Unbroken silence. Not even the gulls were squawking.

As soon as Mum started walking, I followed her with the torch so she could see where she was putting her feet. Without hesitation, her shoes walked into the sea. The water was soon up to her knees. She seemed to be in shock as she took in all that dark water tugging at her shoes, growing wider with every step.

I tried to shine the torch in the direction she was looking. Any second now, Dad would surface, coughing and choking, and here she was, ready to grab hold of him and haul him up onto the beach. Any second now, he would emerge from the water. He had to. Especially now that Mum was here. We’d see his head above the waves, like a football floating toward us. ‘Look! Look over there,’ I’d shout, jumping onto Mum’s back and catching him in the torchlight. We’d wade further into the sea, put his arms around our shoulders the way they do in films, and help him ashore. After that he’d probably belt me one across the face, but I wouldn’t care. At least he’d be back.

‘Tell me.’ Mum gripped my chin between her thumb and forefinger. ‘Tell me what happened here.’

‘He was swimming, I think. That’s what it looked like. And all of a sudden he was underwater and further and further away.’

‘And what did you do?’

I fell silent.

‘Why didn’t you tell me right away?’

‘But I did tell you.’

She snatched the torch from my hands and we rounded the cove till we reached the rocks. We balanced on the boulders and tore open our hands on the barnacles. Normally she’d be nagging me to be careful up here, but now she kept climbing on ahead and calling out his name.

Suddenly I caught sight of something in a small inlet. A dark object was floating in the water a few feet below me, thumping and splashing. I wanted to jump in, but I wasn’t brave enough. I shouted to Mum a few yards up ahead. ‘I’ve found something!’

She slipped and dropped the torch. It rolled away but came to rest in a crevice between two rocks. She scrambled to her feet, picked up the torch, and lunged toward me. ‘Where? Where?’ Anxiously, she aimed the torch at the dark water beneath us. A tree trunk covered in seaweed was slamming into the rocks. ‘Oh Christ,’ she shouted. ‘Jesus fucking Christ.’

We clambered on. At the highest point she stopped and sent a