In the ’80s Bernard Pivot, the famous host of a French cultural program, created a spelling championship. At the time, a Dutch journalist who happened to be a correspondent in France took part in the contest. (There is a special competition just for foreigners.) He liked it so much that he decided to organize a spelling championship in the Netherlands.

These competitions differ from spelling bees in the United States. The spelling championship challenge consists of a more or less coherent text. Participants are asked to write what they hear on a piece of paper. A jury checks the transcriptions, and the person who has the least mistakes wins.

The spelling championships in the Netherlands have become, like they did in France, a national tradition. They are broadcast on television, and every year more than one million people watch.

To me, this is all extremely awkward. I make a living as an author, but I consider linguistic purism more of an innocent disease than a virtue.

About six months ago, I was asked to write the text for this year’s spelling championship in the Netherlands. (A couple of years ago, the organizers decided that it was a good idea to ask an author to write the text.)

I hesitated. While I would never participate in a spelling championship, not even for money, this was an exquisite chance for me to dictate to more than one million people a piece of writing on a subject that was to my liking. The only limitation was that there should be a few difficult words in the text—which is not much of a limitation. I should add that a group of famous Dutchmen and famous people from Flanders, where Dutch is also spoken, always take part in the contest. They are singers, actors, members of parliament, and television anchormen.

So I decided to say yes. I wrote a short essay of approximately 350 words on Civilization and Its Discontents by Sigmund Freud. I was very much aware that just mentioning the name Freud provokes an allergic reaction in some people. That was exactly one of the reasons why I chose this subject. Even if you have your doubts about psychoanalysis, you have to admit that Freud is an excellent writer. He has many important, and provocative, things to say about human behavior.

After many long deliberations with the championship’s experts about the right amount of difficult words to include, my text was approved.

On a Saturday in December, the competition took place in a famous hall in The Hague where the senate usually confers.

I read my text aloud and saw how the contestants started to write. I knew they were focusing on the right spelling. Still, some of Freud’s ideas must have entered their minds.

One of the participants was a member of parliament for a small, right wing, Christian Dutch party.

Somehow, it gave me a weird thrill to watch while this man was writing down the words “Oedipus complex.” It’s quite probable that my pleasure was extremely Freudian.