Charlotte Van den Broeck was born in Turnhout, Belgium, in 1991. After studies in English and German, she took a Masters in Drama at the Royal Conservatoire in Antwerp. She has published three collections of poetry, Kameleon (2015), which was awarded the Herman de Coninck debut prize for poetry by a Flemish author; Nachtroer (2017), which was nominated for the VSB Poetry Prize 2018 and the Ida Gerhard Prize; and Aarduitwrijvingen (2021). The first two volumes are combined in Chameleon | Nachtroer, translated from the Dutch by David Colmer (Bloodaxe Books, 2020). David Colmer's translation of Aarduitwrijvingen will be published by Bloodaxe in 2025 under the title The Inside of a Stone. Her poetry has also been translated into German, Spanish, French, Serbian and Arabic. In 2016 she opened the Frankfurt Bookfair together with Dutch poet Arnon Grunberg. In 2017 she was one of that year’s Versopolis poets, performing at several European festivals including Ledbury in Britain. In 2022 David McKay's translation of her prose book Bold Ventures: Thirteen Tales of Architectural Tragedy (Waagstukken) was published by Chatto. As well as publishing critically acclaimed books she is renowned for her distinctive performances, which differ from UK/US versions of spoken word as theatre pieces ‘searching for the speakability and experience of oral poetry’, now presented in English as well as Dutch.
Author photo: Koen Broos
