Time is the space in which life unfolds, but time is hard to get a grip on. Minutes can last for centuries and years seem like two seconds. What is time? Humans have little time; that is their tragedy. At the same time, the awareness of that limited time gives our lives depth and meaning. What philosophy may not be able to explain can be expressed through literature.

As a writer, you can play with time and have the freedom to determine the chronology of the book, to speed up or slow down time. How does a writer compress a lifetime or a few centuries? Is a book a small time factory? Too many questions in too little time, but Connie Palmen and Annelies Verbeke answered them anyway! Moderator was writer and essayist Mira Feticu.

Connie Palmen always seeks out the border between fact and fiction in her work. She became well-known in the Netherlands with her debut novel and two following best-sellers. She has written several essay collections, such as 
Het geluk van de eenzaamheid (The Joy of Loneliness, 2009) en Het drama van de afhankelijkheid (The Drama of Dependency, 2017). Many of her novels are based on events in her own life, and her essays are more narrative than usual. In 2023 she published Voornamelijk vrouwen (Mostly Women), personal essays about eleven women and one man who shape their lives in their own headstrong ways. Palmen debates with and challenges them, uncovering differences and similarities with her own life. Her award-winning work is internationally successful and translated into many languages.

Annelies Verbeke writes novels, stories, film scripts and theatre pieces. In 2003 she debuted with Slaap! (Sleep!), followed by three novels, four short-story collections, the collection of journalistic stories Wakker (Awake, co-created with photographer Charlie De Keersmaecker), and the graphic novella Tirol Inferno, written in iambic pentameter and rhyme, co-created with illustrator Klaas Verplancke. Her work has won various prizes and been translated into many languages. In 2023 she published Koude soep (Cold Soup) in the Terloops Series and JIJ, an anthology of you-stories.

Mira Feticu is a writer, poet and columnist. In 2012 she published her first novel in Dutch: Lief kind van mij (Sweet Child of Mine), followed by De ziekte van Kortjakje (Kortjakje's Disease, 2013). Both books are about a Romanian immigrant who grew up under Ceausescu and is unable to settle down in the Netherlands, but who flourishes as she distances herself from her husband. Her third novel Tascha, about an art robbery in a Rotterdam museum, appeared in 2015, followed by Al mijn vaders (All My Fathers), Picasso's keerzijde (Picasso's Flipside) and Liefdesverklaring aan de Nederlandse taal (Love Letter to the Dutch Language, 2021).

Festival tip: Connie Palmen talked with artist Sven Ratzke about their theatre show Marlene and about masculinity and femininity on Saturday afternoon, 20 January 2024, at Theater aan het Spui; later that day she contributed to a conversation during Saturday Night Unlimited with Celeste Ng and Sacha Bronwasser about the voice of the character.