About Me — Saskia V

“I get knocked down, but I get up again. You are never gonna keep me down.” (“Tubthumping” by Chumbawamba)

From left: My BFF, a handsome man, and me

I celebrated my 50th birthday in 2020 — in two separate rooms connected by video because of coronavirus regulations. So, I grew up in England in the 1970s. As observed in the BBC drama Life on Mars, it was a different planet. Everyone smoked everywhere, and we frolicked unrestrained in the backs of cars or on buses.

Schools didn’t have anti-bullying policies, and corporal punishment was allowed. “Spare the rod” attitudes lingered and shaming was thought beneficial. The song “Baggy Trousers” by Madness sums up school life in Britain in the 1980s. I wished I could have gone to Grange Hill, the eponymous school of the TV series, but sadly it was fictitious.

Fiction and music were my great escapes. I’ve also traveled widely, including around the Soviet Union as the sun was setting on it; I studied Russian at university. I’ve always had a talent for learning languages and have worked as a translator and editor, but I’m a writer at heart.

In the Amsterdam Hortus Botanicus, July 2020