studied Russian and Polish in Amsterdam, Warsaw and Copenhagen and has worked since 1979 as literary translator with work in Danish, Russian and, primarily, Polish. In 1997 he received the Martinus Nijhoff Prize for his translations of work by Bruno Schulz. He has also published translations of work by, amongst others, Zbigniew Herbert, Wislawa Szymborska, Czeslaw Milosz, Aleksander Wat and Ryszard Kapucinski. He has also published Bitter Harvest. Polish poetry of the 20th century (2000).