De Situatie: Tussen Proza en Protest
In this edition of De Situatie, Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer and Sophie Straat meet on stage for a charged exchange between poetry and protest, style and stance, beauty and confrontation.
Pfeijffer, a classically trained poet and razor-sharp stylist, draws a Europe clinging to its own reflection. His layered rhetoric reveals how nostalgia and self-image prop each other up in a culture under pressure.
Sophie Straat takes a different tone. She blends folk, punk and satire into fierce social criticism. Her lyrics cut through sexism, gentrification and class divide. Without softening the blow.
What happens when these two voices collide? What can style still do in a grotesque reality? And where does the artist stand when nuance is under siege?
This night isn’t about agreement or ease. It’s about friction, form and what art can still hold. If you’re willing to be in it, not just watching.
Photography by: Stephan Vanfleteren
AUTHOR
Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer
Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer (NL) is a poet, classicist, and the author of modern classics such as La Superba, Letters from Genoa, and Grand Hotel Europa. Alkibiades is his most ambitious novel.
Alkibiades
Photography by: Chantal Spieard
SINGER
Sophie Straat
Protest singer Sophie Straat experienced a meteoric rise in her career. Her debut EP ’T Is Niet Mijn Schuld (2020) won an Edison Award, and her debut album Smartlap Is Niet Dood (2023) earned nominations for the 3FM Awards, Edisons, and the Amsterdam Prize for the Arts.
In addition to her music, Sophie is a multidisciplinary artist who also creates artwork, photographs, and films, such as the short film Mooier Als Je Lacht, which revolves around three songs from her album.
Sophie Straat is here to say something with her protest songs, with the ultimate goal of sparking change. Because the world is messed up and only getting worse—but “the revolution can no longer be stopped” (-De Standaard, BE).
Photography by: Roeltje van de Sande Bakhuyzen
INTERVIEWER
Dario Goldbach
Dario Goldbach (1992) wants to write books for people who don’t read. During the pandemic, he published the novella Vier Weekenden in close collaboration with the Hague-based cultural venue PIP. This publication caught the attention of publisher De Arbeiderspers, where he made his literary debut in 2023 with De Man die Alles Had (The Man Who Had Everything), a novel about a tech giant, an ever-growing lie, and an unattainable love.
De man die alles had
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