Dutch · Beginner
Read Een Delftshavensche kwajongen in Dutchwith every sentence explained
English title: A Delfshaven Rascal
P. Louwerse · 1880
Free to start · iPhone, iPad & Mac
About the book
Een Delftshavensche kwajongen by P. Louwerse was first published in 1880. In Passage you read the full text in the original Dutch, marked beginner and filed under children and historical fiction. It runs to about 74,100 words.
Expelled from school. Brawling on the dyke. Bound one day for glory.
Delfshaven, August 1591. Pieter Pieterszoon Heyn — Piet to everyone — has just been thrown out of Master Zegers' school: when the schoolmaster swung his wooden paddle, Piet pulled back his hand and the poor man nearly broke his own kneecap. Now the master's nephews from Rotterdam want revenge, and the muddy Maas dyke becomes the battlefield for a furious fight between the boys of the two towns.
Piet's father, a tough old Sea Beggar, wants him to learn the skipper's trade; his mother prays for him every night. Soon the restless boy goes to sea, where he learns what storms, chains and war really mean, and grows from street rascal into one of the boldest sailors of his age.
P. Louwerse, a favourite Dutch youth author, tells the life of the legendary admiral who would one day capture the Spanish silver fleet — a hero still celebrated in Dutch song.
- Author
- P. Louwerse
- First published
- 1880
- Language
- Dutch
- Level
- Beginner
- Genre
- Children, Historical Fiction
- Length
- About 74,100 words
How it opens
Al lang hadden de Delftenaars, die in het Graafschap Holland en zelfs vrij ver er buiten een’ aanzienlijken handel dreven in bier en boter, verlangend uitgezien naar een’ waterweg, die de stad met de breede Maas in verbinding zou stellen. Met geld en goede woorden kon men toen bij de Graven van Holland nogal wat gedaan krijgen. De Delftenaars beproefden dat bij den Graaf, die Albrecht van Beieren heette, en het gelukte. Door een Grafelijken voorrechtsbrief kreeg Delft vergunning om eene haven naar de Maas te graven. Delft was dus eene havenstad geworden.
Reading Een Delftshavensche kwajongen in Passage
Passage sets the book as a quiet, paginated reader in Dutch. Read at your own pace, and when a sentence stops you, tap it. You get:
- a natural translation of that exact sentence,
- a short note on the grammar, in plain words,
- the key words, which you can save with the sentence they came from,
- all of it in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Turkish or Portuguese, whichever you read best.
It's marked beginner, so it's a good first whole book if you know the basics of Dutch and want something you can finish. The words you save come back later in short review games, so the book keeps teaching after you close it.
