Robert Van Gulik (1910-1967) was a Dutch author of historical mystery novels and short stories. He wrote the Judge Dee Mysteries series. Van Gulik was born in the Netherlands, but spent his early years in (what is now) Jakarta, Indonesia and learned multiple languages. He earned his PhD from Leiden University back home in 1935. Van Gulik would then end up working as a linguist for the Dutch Foreign Service. He was in Tokyo at the time World War II broke out, so he was evacuated and ended up in China where he got married. The rest of Van Gulik’s life was spent moving all over the world, but he ended up dying in The Hague, The Netherlands. At the time of his death, he was the Dutch ambassador to Japan.
Robert Van Gulik became a published author in 1948 with the translation Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee. His first original work was The Chinese Maze Murders. His final work was Murder in Canton, published in 1966. Below is a list of Robert Van Gulik’s books in order of when they were originally released:
Publication Order of Judge Dee Mysteries Books
Chronological Order of Judge Dee Mysteries Books
Publication Order of Standalone Novels
Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books
Publication Order of Anthologies
Notes: Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee was originally published in Chinese as Dee Goong An by an unknown author, and translated by Robert Van Gulik. Poets and Murder was also titled The Fox-Magic Murders.
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Robert Van Gulik Synopsis: In The Chinese Gold Murders by Robert Van Gulik (book 2 of the series), Judge Dee is investigating the murder of his predecessor. Things are made more difficult by the disappearance of his chief clerk as well as the the new bride of a wealthy local ship owner. Meanwhile, a tiger is terrorizing the district, the ghost of the murdered magistrate stalks the tribunal, a prostitute has a secret message for Dee, and the body of a murdered monk is discovered to be in the wrong grave.
