Tim Krabbé

Tim Krabbé (born in Amsterdam in 1943) is a Dutch journalist, novelist and chess player. He writes in Dutch, and although he is little known outside the Netherlands, several of his novels have reached European readers through translation and a film adaptation.

His writing has appeared in most of the major Dutch periodicals. At home he is best known for The Rider (De Renner, 1978), a novel that tries to convey what it feels like to race as a competitive cyclist. English-speaking readers know him mainly through The Vanishing (Het Gouden Ei, 1984), a story about the search for a woman who has disappeared, told with a restrained tone and a misleading structure. Krabbé co-wrote the script for the 1988 Dutch film based on it. A poorly received American remake followed in 1993. He later published The Cave (De grot, 1997) and, in 2009, wrote the Boekenweek gift book Een Tafel vol Vlinders.

Krabbé is also a serious chess player. He competed in two Dutch Chess Championships, in 1967 and 1971, and reached a peak FIDE rating of 2290. That interest runs through his articles and his chess website, much of which is devoted to chess problems. His family has been in the public eye too: he is the brother of the actor Jeroen Krabbé, a relationship that has become distant, and the uncle of the media personality Martijn Krabbé.

His legacy lies in the space between psychological fiction and chess writing. He is remembered for bringing the language of sport and the chessboard to general readers without giving up precision.