LooseLeaves: Gerry SmythHeinrich Böll's Irish Journal has come to be regarded as being hugely influential in creating an image of Ireland that drew many Germans to this country, not only as visitors, but also to live here.
Böll (below) is referred to as The Father of German Tourism in Ireland in one of the discussion titles for a forthcoming conference on Böll and Ireland. To mark the 50th anniversary of the publication of Böll's journal, the Centre for German-Irish Studies in the University of Limerick has organised the three-day conference, which begins on August 30th in the university.
Böll's real Irish association is, of course, with Achill Island in Co Mayo, which he visited in the early 1950s, first as a holiday-maker and later as a resident when he bought a cottage there. His now famous Irisches Tagebuch was written in the Achill cottage during 1954-1955. That cottage is now often a site of pilgrimage for German visitors to the island as well as a writers' and artists' retreat.
The Böll conference, in the university's Engineering Building, also marks the 10th anniversary of Limerick's Centre for Irish-German Studies. As well as lectures and discussions examining Irish-German literary and cultural connections, there will be an art exhibition by René Böll and Günter Beckers, to be opened by Virginia Teehan, director of the Hunt Museum.
An impressive list of participants includes Prof Eda Sagarra; Minister for the Environment John Gormley; newly elected TD Martin Mansergh; the Irish Ambassador to Germany, David Donoghue; the German ambassador to Ireland, Christian Pauls; and former Irish ambassador to Germany (and now Ambassador to Italy) Seán Ó hUiginn.
Other contributors include author Hugo Hamilton, whose latest book, The Island of Talking - so far published only in German - is an update of Böll's Irish Journal; Achill-born poet John F Deane, who was one of the initiators of the Böll cottage as a retreat; German-born, Galway-based poet Eva Bourke; poet Gabriel Rosenstock; Prof Eoin Bourke, recently retired from UCG's German department; sculptor Imogen Stuart; Derek Scally, Berlin correspondent for this newspaper; Wolfgang Hoffmann, director of the Dublin Fringe Festival; and John McHugh, secretary of the
Achill Island Böll Committee; as well as the committee president, Dr Edward King. A screening of the film Heinrich Böll's Children of Éire, will also take place during the conference.
For inquiries and registration, contact Claudia Reese, conference secretary, at claudia.reese@ul.ie.
Irish exile Gibson hot in Spain
While Heinrich Böll was drawn from his native Germany to Ireland, Dublin-born Ian Gibson (below) was drawn to Spain, where he has lived for many years and is now regarded as one of their own. Having earned wide international acclaim for his biographies of poet and playwright Federico García Lorca and artist Salvador Dalí, Gibson has now added a novel to his string of successes.
According to the Guardian this week, "stocks of Ian Gibson's Viento del Sur (Wind of the South), which has had a substantial print run for Spain, of 14,000 copies, are rapidly being depleted by booksellers' re-orders".
The novel, which is written in Spanish and has received favourable reviews, is, according to the report, a "disguised autobiography, it tears into British society, examining class, religion, loveless families, vice-ridden public schools, as well as stiff upper lips and even the cricketer's googly".
"I couldn't have published this book in English because of the hurt to my relatives and schools," said Gibson, who has held Spanish nationality for more than 20 years. After graduating from Trinity College Dublin, he went on to teach Spanish literature at Queen's University Belfast and later in London universities.
Viento del Sur's central character is an English academic who finds literary recognition in post-Franco Spain but has to flee his paradise in Granada because it is invaded by "ghastly" Britons after his book, "A Year in Andalucía", becomes a bestseller.
Gibson is also the author of a book on the life of the major Spanish poet, Antonio Machado. Ligero de Equipaje, La Vida de Antonio Machado, which was written in Spanish and so far has been published only in Spain, will hopefully be made available to a wider audience. The same goes for his first novel.