- During World War II he was employed as a nurse in a hospital in Lübeck in Germany.
- His work has won various prizes in the Netherlands and Belgium, and he has been awarded the prestigious "alternative Nobel Prize in Literature, the America Award, which he received from The Contemporary Arts Educational Project " for his lifetime contribution to international writing". Previous winners include such literary giants as Harold Pinter, Peter Handke, and José Saramago.
- From 1957 up to 1978 he worked at the publisher Ontwikkeling (English: Development).
- From his book Alfa (1963), which is now regarded as a classic, onwards, he could be described as a formalistic writer who sets aside everything typical of traditional narrative to arrive at a text that brings about direct contact with the reader.
- In 1977 he was awarded the Belgian State Prize for Narrative Prose for: Een tuin tussen hond en wolf. (Filmed in 1979 by director André Delvaux as: Een vrouw tussen hond en wolf/ Woman Between Wolf and Dog).
- He worked as a laboratory assistant for a while, and from 1948 up to 1957 he worked as a journalist at Het Handelsblad.
- From 1959 until 1983 he was editor, and editorial secretary of the Nieuw Vlaams Tijdschrift.
- After the war, and through self-study, cultural contacts and travel, he acquired the knowledge he needed for the broad range of jobs he had during his life.
- In 1979, he established himself as a full-time writer in the Vaucluse (France).
- From 1966 up to 1978 he also taught at the Hoger Rijksinstituut voor Toneel- en Cultuurspreiding in Brussels.
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