Geert is an autistic boy, born to Janine, his alcoholic mother. He takes things literally and considers language something that means exactly what it says.
Take the word in Dutch for ‘to move’ which is ‘verhuizen’ and contains the word ‘ver’, which means ‘far away’. So ‘verhuizen’ should, in Geert’s view, also take place far away. Also, when his mother tells him that he should make a girl wet before making love to her he throws a bucket of water over a girl.
Things just don’t work the way he thinks they should. Because of the way his mind works, he likes to add up things, and combines different machines in order to construct new objects. Through this, he discovers his talent of building violins out of benches, and starts a prosperous business by selling them to a German merchant. He combines this business with caring for a carrier pigeon that always returns to him after flying. As disparate as all these actions and obsessions may seem, they still form a unity for Geert, and the reader is permitted a strange but fascinating insight into his unusual, yet pure and innocent, mind.
