Editing Willem Elsschot (section)

== Early life and education ==
[[File:La Revue continentale.jpg|thumb|288x288px|Excerpt from the magazine ''La Revue'' of Willem Elsschot.<ref>{{Cite web|title=La Revue continentale illustrée: industrie, finance, commerce, éducation. Vol.4 Nr.10-11|url=https://lib.ugent.be/viewer/archive.ugent.be:464CCB14-4DA8-11E1-BEAC-D3843B7C8C91#?c=&m=&s=&cv=11&xywh=1256,31,7496,5582|access-date=2020-10-05|website=lib.ugent.be}}</ref>]]

Elsschot was born Alphonsus Josephus de Ridder on 7 May 1882 in [[Antwerp]], to a family of bakers. As a child he would often visit his uncle in rural Blauberg, near [[Herselt]], where they would walk in the Helschot area, from which he would later derive his [[pen name]].

After studying at a state school in Van Maerlantstraat, then the Royal Athenaeum of Antwerp, he attended the ''Institut Supérieur de Commerce de l'État'' <small>([[:nl:Rijkshandelshogeschool|nl]])</small>, later known as the ''Rijkshandelshogeschool,'' where he would study economics and business, achieving a masters' degree in commercial sciences in 1904. It was during his studies there that he would develop a love for literature, while under the tutorship of [[Charles Polydore de Mont|Pol de Mont]].