20th-century Dutch novelists

Jacoba van Velde (10 May 1903, in The Hague – 7 September 1985, in Amsterdam) was a Dutch writer, translator, and dramaturge. Her first novel, De grote zaal (The Great Hall), appeared in the literary journal Querido in 1953 and was translated into thirteen languages within ten years. During her life around 75,000 copies of De grote zaal were sold. In 2010, the book was chosen for the Nederland Leest (Netherlands Reads) campaign and copies were given away for free to members of all the public libraries in The Netherlands.

Anthonie "Anton" Koolhaas (16 November 1912 – 16 December 1992) was a Dutch journalist, novelist, and scenario writer.

Mathilda (Til) Brugman (16 September 1888, Amsterdam – 24 July 1958, Gouda) was a Dutch author, poet, translator, and linguist.

Isa Hoes (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈisaː ɦus]; born 13 June 1967) is a Dutch actress. She is best known for her role as Myriam van der Pol in the ongoing Dutch soap opera Goede Tijden, Slechte Tijden.

Marga Minco (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈmɑrɣaː ˈmɪŋkoː]; 31 March 1920 – 10 July 2023) born Sara Menco, and for some time known as Marga Faes was a Dutch journalist and writer, and a Holocaust survivor. She married Dutch poet Bert Voeten.

Piet Oege Bakker (10 August 1897 – 1 April 1960) was a Dutch journalist and writer. He was joint editor for many years of the weekly magazine Elseviers Weekblad.
His most famous work was the trilogy written between 1941 and 1946 dealing with the experiences of the street urchin Ciske Vrijmoeth, alias Ciske the Rat. These novels sold in their hundreds of thousands, and later appeared in translation in more than ten other countries. The story has been filmed twice, in 1955 and 1984, and a musical version ran from October 2007 to November 2009.

Jan Hendrik Wolkers (26 October 1925 – 19 October 2007) was a Dutch author, sculptor and painter. Wolkers is considered by some to be one of the "Great Four" writers of post-World War II Dutch literature, alongside Willem Frederik Hermans, Harry Mulisch and Gerard Reve (the latter authors are also known as the "Great Three").Wolkers was born in Oegstgeest. He became noted as an author in the 1960s mainly for his graphic descriptions of sexual acts, which were often subject of controversy. His 1969 novel Turks Fruit was translated into ten different languages and published in English as Turkish Delight. It was also made into a highly successful movie, the Paul Verhoeven-directed Turks Fruit (1972) which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and in 1999 won the award for Best Dutch Film of the Century.Wolkers declined several literary awards. In 1982 he refused the Constantijn Huygensprijs, and in 1989 he refused the P.C. Hooftprijs.
From 1980 until his death, Wolkers resided on the Dutch island of Texel. He died on 19 October 2007, aged 81, at his Texel home and was cremated in Amsterdam at De Nieuwe Ooster cemetery.
A number of his outdoor sculptures in the Netherlands have been subject to vandalism, presumably due to his use of glass as a construction material. Some examples are the Auschwitz monument in Amsterdam and the monument on the dike at Ceres on Texel. In reaction to the destruction of the monument in 2003, Wolkers announced that he would use less glass and more steel for such monuments in future. The Jac. P. Thijsse monument on Texel does contain more steel, but glass is still a substantial part of the artwork.
Since 2019, the private and literary archive of Jan Wolkers has been available at Leiden University Library.

Gerrit Jan Komrij (30 March 1944 – 5 July 2012) was a Dutch poet, novelist, translator, critic, polemic journalist and playwright. He rose to prominence in the early 1970s, writing poetry that sharply contrasted with the free-form poetry of his contemporaries. He acquired a reputation for his prose in the late 1970s, writing acerbic essays and columns often critical of writers, television programs, and politicians. As a literary critic and especially as an anthologist he had a formative influence on Dutch literature: his 1979 anthology of Dutch poetry of the 19th and 20th centuries, reformed the canon, and was followed by anthologies of Dutch poetry of the 17th and 18th centuries, of Afrikaans poetry, and of children's poetry. Those anthologies and a steady stream of prose and poetry publications solidified his reputation as one of the country's leading writers and critics; he was awarded the highest literary awards including the P. C. Hooft Award (1993), and from 2000 to 2004, he was the Dutch Dichter des Vaderlands (Poet Laureate). Komrij died in 2012 at age 68.

Johannes Aloysius Antonius Engelman (born Utrecht, 7 June 1900; died Amsterdam, 20 March 1972) was a Dutch writer. He was the recipient of the Constantijn Huygens Prize in 1954. Dutch composers like Marius Monnikendam and Marjo Tal set several of his works to music.

Jan de Hartog (April 22, 1914 – September 22, 2002) was a Dutch playwright, novelist and occasional social critic who moved to the United States in the early 1960s and became a Quaker.