The Wartime Turn to Flemish Activism

My presentation will discuss the insertion of the “Flemish question” into Belgium’s experience of war and occupation in 1914-1918.  I will focus on René De Clercq, a poet and journalist long active in the prewar Flemish nationalist movement.  Nevertheless, he wrote in support of Belgium’s cause at the outbreak of war and he only came into conflict with the Belgian government the following year.  This episode became a key moment in Flemish activism.  My analysis will situate De Clercq’s shift in loyalty in terms of the place of Belgium in the larger strategic and propaganda struggle between the great powers and the role of (national) poets during the Great War.