Jan van Beers (22 February 1821 – 14 November 1888) was a Belgian poet born in Antwerp.

[1] Van Beers started life as a teacher of Dutch language and literature, first at Mechelen, then at Lier, and in 1860 was appointed a professor of both at the Athenaeum (high school) in Antwerp, where he had also been a sub-librarian in the communal library.

Van Beers as a teacher was early in the field, with Hendrik Conscience, Willems and others, when the Flemish movement began.

[2] In the following year an edition de luxe of his poetry was published, adorned with pen-and-ink sketches by Jan van Beers the younger, and a popular edition of his collected poems was published at Ghent and Rotterdam in 1873 and 1884.

Van Beers's poetry, full of glow and pathos, simple yet forcible, is somewhat akin to that of Longfellow.