Cemetery Strolls with Writers: Cees Nooteboom
Invalidenfriedhof
Berlin, Germany
December 16, 2009
“Writers in cemeteries around the world? That book already exists. Cees Nooteboom wrote it.” I remember turning very red on that day in early 2009 when my colleague at Deutschlandradio Kultur spoke those words. “He made it in collaboration with his wife, a photographer.” My heart throbbed in my throat. I went to the nearest computer to do a search and found Nooteboom’s book Tumbas: Graves of Poets and Thinkers. I eased myself into the office chair. Nooteboom had not written about any living authors in cemeteries.
