Listened to the audiobook with Ricardo Blei. Well-read.

I often say that I like to read classics, and Torenhoog en Mijlenbreed is certainly a classic of Dutch science fiction and children’s literature. Unfortunately, it appears never to have been translated to English. Ironically, Dragt derived the Dutch title Torenhoog en Mijlenbreed from a line of Robert Louis Stevenson’s poem Travel: “Where are forests, hot as fire / Wide as England, tall as a spire.”

Dragt didn’t just draw inspiration for the title from the poem: in her imagination, Venus is a warm and moist planet with a dense forest cover hidden under thick layers of rainclouds. Humans have established permanent bases underneath large domes, but do not dare to venture into the forests. As a result, Venus remains a mystery despite many generations of planetary researchers exploring the areas around the domes.

To us, who can google pictures of the bare volcanic plains of the surface of Venus, the story seems about as outdated as Arthur Clarke’s The Sands of Mars, but when Torenhoog en Mijlenbreed was published in 1969, no probe had penetrated the clouds of Venus’ atmosphere yet, and the story was at least possible.

Either way, it doesn’t matter too much whether the story takes place on Venus or some other imagined exoplanet. The story is ultimately not about the planet as much as it is about human interactions and communication.

Dragt sets this up very well: the close environment of the dome, the mysterious policies of the headquarters keeping researchers out of the forest, the psychological interviews the researchers undergo all add to the sense that the main character is being hemmed in and held back, causing the reader to share his curiosity for the fiery forests of Venus.

When the protagonist finally takes action, the increasingly complex emotional interactions with the various characters that follow are the perfect backdrop to explore what it really means to communicate and understand, whether over radios, with words, or in thoughts.

Torenhoog en Mijlenbreed is a children’s book, but it is not the themes but perhaps rather the level of complexity of the words and worldbuilding that show it is aimed at younger readers. I think Torenhoog en Mijlenbreed achieves an emotional depth that many grown up sci-fi stories never reach.

All I can say is that Torenhoog en Mijlenbreed once more prove that Tonke Dragt is the undisputed master of the speculative genre in Dutch. Again, it is unfortunate that the novel was never translated to English – but if you read Dutch and have never tried it, I have no hesitation recommending it to readers of all ages!