Renate Stoute - Uit Een Oude Jas Vol Stenen

1999, Dutch, Renate Stoute, René Stoute,

Original title: "Uit een oude jas vol stenen: de geboorte van een vrouw" (From An Old Coat Full of Stones: The birth of a woman) by Renate Stoute.

In 2022, David de Poel published the biography of Renate Stoute titled - "Oefeningen in dapperheid: Biografie van René/Renate Stoute" (Exercises in bravery: Biography of René/Renate Stoute).

In the book, Renate Stoute sheds light on the history of support for the transgender community in the Netherlands, the solidarity, the disinterest from the feminist camp, the discrimination, the coming out of trans women and the slowly changing attitude of the outside world. But above all, she tells the harrowing history of her own identity.

According to Wikipedia, René/Renate Stoute (1950-2000) was a Dutch writer and poet. In 1995, she started hormone replacement therapy, followed in December 1996 by gender reassignment surgery. From 1994 she had called herself Renée, but after the operation, she went through life as Renate Stoute. 

She made her debut as a novelist in 1982 with the book On the Back of Dirty Swans, which is inspired by her life as a drug addict, which lasted until the age of 27. In 1980, she published a collection of poetry; Cloudburst over Lake Garda. She wrote a dozen of books related to drug use, transsexualism and transvestism. She had two daughters from a previous marriage. In 1998, she married Janis Wagemans. In March 2000, she died suddenly of liver cancer.

Available via bol.com

Photo via literatuurmuseum.nl