Tachtigers

The Tachtigers, or De Tachtigers (The Eights), was a Dutch literary movement that emerged in the 1880s. It brought together a group of young writers who challenged the prevailing Realist and socially oriented prose of the time and advocated a poetry and prose based on individual sensibility, aesthetic refinement, and the primacy of art for art’s sake.

Key aims and style. The Tachtigers emphasized personal experience, subjective emotion, and the inner life as the source of artistic truth. They sought to free Dutch literature from didacticism and explicit social commentary, arguing that literature should primarily strive for beauty and truth through refined language, imagery, and mood. Stylistically, they experimented with form, rhythm, and diction, incorporating natural speech, lyric immediacy, and psychological depth. Their aesthetic often drew on French Symbolism and Romantic influence, and they favored a more delicate, impressionistic approach over blunt realism.

Publications and platforms. The movement was closely linked to new literary journals, most notably De Nieuwe Gids, which provided a platform for its essays, poems, and manifestos. Through these publications, the Tachtigers promoted a shift toward individual voice, personal tone, and a more intimate, aesthetically focused poetry.

Members and influence. Among its best-known figures were Willem Kloos, Jacques Perk, and Herman Gorter, who helped define the movement’s direction and ideals and contributed to its early anthologies and magazines. While the group was relatively short-lived as a formal movement, its emphasis on lyric expression, subjectivity, and stylistic experimentation left a lasting imprint on Dutch poetry and helped pave the way for later modernist currents in the Netherlands.