Fedde Schurer

Dutch and Frisian writer, poet, translator, journalist and politician who made ground breaking contributions to the Frisian culture.

Schurer was born in a Frisian speaking working family: his father Bouke was a shipyard labourer and his mother a maidservant. After visiting the elementary school Schurer worked as a junior carpenter, but in the evening hours he studied to become a school teacher (1917-1919). His first job as a teacher was at the reformed school in Lemmer (1919-1930), the same school he visited as a boy. Here he also met the school teacher Willy de Vries, whom he married 1 July 1924. They got no children, but they adopted a son.

In 1919 Schurer became member of the Kristlik Frysk Selskip (Christian Frisian Club), that strived to translate Christian liturgy and the bible into the Frisian language to enable Frisians to worship services in their mother language. Here he published his first poems. His first bundle "Fersen" (songs) came out in 1925.

In the twenties Schurer developed a more pacifistic and liberal view on Christianity, which brought him in conflict with the board of his "Gereformeerde" Calvinistic school (1929). He changed his religion to the less dogmatic and more socialistic "hersteld verband" under the influence of Karl Barth and the socialistic theologian Jan Buskes (b.16 Sept 1899).

In 1930 he was dismissed as a teacher and went to Amsterdam. He taught on secular schools and went in 1935 into provincial politics with the slogan "No Führer, but Schurer". He translated the poetry of Heinrich Heine into the Frisian language and also wrote illegal anti Nazi poetry during the war. For this he was awarded in 1945 with a state prize for resistance poetry.

After the WW2 he became editor in chief of the Heerenveense Koerier, later renamed to De Friesche Koerier, a local newspaper. He was a promotor of the use of the Frisian language in public arena and edited and published in cultural periodicals in the Frisian language .