Deventer breathes Dickens

At the end of November 2020, the book 'Deventer ademt Dickens' was published: a special anniversary book initiated by Steffie Schoemans with 50 personal and candid stories and photos of people involved in the Dickens Festival in Deventer. The book has 152 pages and is published by the Dickens Festival organization. 

Steffie Schoemans and Arnold Joost recorded stories behind 30 years of Dickens in words and images. From residents to actors, from choir members to people behind the scenes. The result is an impressive book with beautiful images and special, moving and funny stories about the connection of people with an event like the Dickens Festival. 'Deventer breathes Dickens' is about being a child in a grown-up dream. About the limitations of growing old, happiness and adversity, sweets and punch and about art and creativity. But above all about a lot of fun, togetherness, involvement and passion.

The book shows how a small initiative by Emmy and Jan Strik, centered around the first Christmas shopping Sunday on Walstraat, has grown into a widely respected cultural event and a tourist attraction that attracts thousands of visitors from the Netherlands and abroad. Never before has the Dickens Festival in Deventer, an event that has been an integral part of the city and its residents for three decades, been captured in such a publication.

The organization of the Dickens Festijn is very pleased and proud of the end result, which is beautifully designed by Denise Brandsma. In this way, Dickens will not simply pass by in 2020.

The book is published by the dEVENTer Foundation, organizer of the Dickens Festival, and is made possible in part by contributions from the Prince Bernhard Culture Fund Overijssel, the Erven Witteveen Foundation and the Wesselings-van Breemen Foundation.