Het horloge dat niet liep

This essay explores the intersection of literature, science, and ethics through Michel Serres’s philosophy of “translation” and its application to Anjet Daanje’s novel Het lied van ooievaar en dromedaris (2022). Daanje’s ambitious work, composed of interwoven novellas enriched with scientific notes, poetry, and historical fragments, culminates in a chapter where a physicist conducts a self-experiment to grasp his comatose partner's experience. This raises profound questions: Can literature represent reality as science does? Can ethical decisions be informed by imaginative experimentation? Drawing on Serres’s analyses of Emile Zola and Virginia Woolf, the essay demonstrates how literature can correspond to scientific knowledge by revealing the structures of time. Zola’s “experimental novel” parallels 19th-century thermodynamics, while Woolf’s To the Lighthouse anticipates contemporary physics by depicting multiple temporalities. Through this lens, Daanje’s novel juxtaposes mechanical time with quantum time, illustrating how the interwovenness of time can illuminate medical-ethical dilemmas. The essay argues that Serres’s philosophy invites us to see literature not as a mere reflection but as a participant in knowledge production, enabling the dialogue between general scientific principles and singular human experience. Ultimately, imagination and narrative emerge as essential for understanding time, chaos, and the ethics of end-of-life decisions.