author
Maarten Maartens
1858–1915
A Dutch novelist who chose to write in English, he was widely read in Britain and the United States around the turn of the twentieth century before slipping into relative obscurity. His fiction is known for sharp social observation, moral tension, and an outsider’s eye on Dutch society.
1 Audiobook
My Lady Nobody: A Novel
by Maarten Maartens
About the author
Born in Amsterdam on August 15, 1858, Maarten Maartens was the pen name of Jozua Marius Willem van der Poorten Schwartz. He studied law in Utrecht, but became known instead for fiction and poetry, building a literary career in English rather than Dutch.
Between the 1880s and 1914, he published numerous novels, short stories, poems, and plays. Contemporary readers in Britain and the United States knew him well, and his work stood out for its mix of psychological insight, social criticism, and interest in questions of conscience, class, and religion.
He spent much of his adult life in Doorn, where he died on August 3, 1915. Although his reputation faded after his death, he remains an intriguing figure: a Dutch writer who found an international audience by writing across languages and cultural borders.