In memoriam Prof.dr. H.T.M. van Vliet
(11 december 1950 – 12 juni 2024)
It is with sadness that we learned of the death of H.T.M. (Dick) van Vliet. Dick was head of the Bureau Basisvoorziening Tekstedities from 1983 to 1992 and director of the Constantijn Huygens Institute from 1992 to 2002. In that position, he turned the Grotius Institute, the Erasmus Commissie, the DuCange Commissie and the Bureau Basisvoorziening Tekstedities (Bureau of Text Editions) into one organisation with a clear emphasis on the field of text editions. Under Dick’s leadership, the ‘CHI’ became the place in the Netherlands where theory and practice of scholarly editing came together. Classical, monumental series such as the Complete Works of Louis Couperus, the Monumenta Literaria Neerlandica series and the Middeleeuwse Verzamelhandschriften uit de Nederlanden (Medieval Anthological Manuscripts from the Netherlands) also put textual scholarship on the international map.
Van Vliet was at the forefront of the transition to digital editions, without neglecting the value of the paper book. Crucial texts by Hugo Grotius found their way to an international academic audience in state-of-the-art editions with commentaries. Last but not least, Van Vliet also distinguished himself as an editor: he edited the works of J.C. Bloem, Louis Couperus, J.H. Leopold, H. Marsman and S. Vestdijk, among others, and published numerous studies on and correspondence from these authors. In recent years, he has focused particularly on the life and work of Louis Couperus, becoming an eminent connoisseur of the writer. Van Vliet enjoyed international prestige as a professor by special appointment of scholarly editing and thus served as a figurehead during a period when, on the eve of the digital revolution, the status of textual scholarship was being questioned.
