Ethel Portnoy (March 8, 1927 – May 25, 2004) was a Dutch writer of prose, who wrote essays, columns, short stories, travel stories and several novels.

Biography

Ethel Portnoy was born in Philadelphia but grew up in the Bronx in New York City as the daughter of Russian-Jewish immigrants. She took classes in English literature in New York City and learned French in the United States, then departed to Europe in 1950 with a Fulbright for the University of Lyon. She also studied cultural anthropology and archeology in Paris, with Claude Lévi-Strauss amongst others. She married Dutch author Rudy Kousbroek (1929–2010) in 1951. She raised two children and until 1962 she worked at the UNESCO. She worked for Dutch papers and was published in Randstad, in the weeklies Haagse Post and Vrij Nederland and also in the NRC Handelsblad. The family moved to The Hague in 1970. In 1978 Portnoy and Hannemieke Stamperius founded the feminist literary journal Chrysallis. Since 1979, she worked at the journal Maatstaf. Portnoy debuted as a novelist in 1971 at the age of 44 with the book Steen en Been. She wrote in English, but considered herself a Dutch writer. Her books were translated by her (ex-)husband (they were divorced in the 1980s), their daughter Hepzibah Kousbroek (1954–2009) and by Tinke Davids.

Works

Most of her books were published by Amsterdam publisher Meulenhoff.

Trivia

The Dutch language is using the term "Broodje Aap" ('monkey sandwich') to refer to urban legends as a result of Portnoy's book with the same title.

Literature