Abstract
Novels from the period 1922-1946 that describe the Zuider Zee works represent both their space and their characters in a specific way. The space of the novel is quite often represented in a negative way, as dead or dying. Even if the novel pays attention to its beauty, it simultaneously underscores either that this beauty is fleeting or that it does not belong to reality, but would be more at home in a museum or in the realm of art. The Zuider Zee novels themselves take part in these processes of ‘musealising’ or aestheticising. The characters, moreover, are not by definition heroic. Quite often, they are represented as the degenerate result of inbreeding. Although nearly all Zuider Zee novels draw attention to the beauty of the original Zuider Zee culture, their treatment of character and space suggests a plea in favour of the ‘vital(ising)’ Zuider Zee project. In the final analysis, these novels succeed in phrasing arguments in favour as well as arguments against the project by means of a metaphorical equation and an appeal to the narrative structure of the Bildungsroman.
