Dutch poetry by discovering language and beauty in a totally new way; but soon he felt them to be elitist. Then, in 1895, he became a member of the newly founded Dutch Social Democratic Workers Party. He alienated himself from the literary circles by claiming that art should be socialistic and by rejecting the class separation between artists and workers. He felt himself to be one with the proletariat and, through them, with "The New Life" and "The New Humanity. " Stimulated by the ongoing theater revival, which he interpreted as an attempt to challenge the bourgeois smugness and moral self-righteousness, he had started to write plays before becoming interested in the Socialist Party.