ABSTRACT
JAN C. (JOHANNES CHRISTIAAN) BRANDT CORSTIUS (1908-85) was a Dutch literary scholar who taught at the Utrecht Gymnasium until 1959 and from 1960 to 1975 was Professor of Comparative Literature at the University of Utrecht, where he also directed the Institute of Comparative Literature. His 1934 doctoral dissertation dealt with the work of the Dutch poet Herman Gorter. Some of his most important publications on Dutch literature are De literatuur van de Nederlanden in de moderne tijd (1959; Literature of the Netherlands in Modern Times) and Geschiedenis van de Nederlandse literatuur (1959; History of Dutch Literature). His approach, however, was always comparative, as in, for instance, De Muze in het morgenlicht. Inleiding tot de geschiedenis van de eenheid der westerse literatuur (1957; The Muses at Dawn: Introduction to the History of the Unity of Western Literature). The textbook Introduction to the Comparative Study of Literature (1968) was his major contribution to the discipline. Infl uenced by the formalism of the New Criticism (Northrop Frye) and Leo Spitzer, Corstius advocated a comparative close analysis of texts with the aim of “showing what is original in a poet” through the comparatist’s wider knowledge of the international context (1968: 133). Another key feature of this textbook is Corstius’s emphasis on the role played by the socio-historical context to comparatively understand a literary work. By recovering the historical background of the textual construction, and most specially of the frequently used terms in a work, writer or period, they “reveal something of their nature” (1968: 172).
