Writers in Residence

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Mapping The Riviera From Monaco
By Anne Fitzgerald: The Ireland Fund of Monaco Writer-in-Residence at the Princess Grace Irish Library

Between the Maritime Alps and the Mediterranean lies the principality of Monaco. Ruled by the Grimaldi family for over 700 years, its Royal Palace and The Princess Grace Irish Library are situated on Grimaldi Rock which overlooks the ports of Fontvielle and Hercule. These ports harbour an artillery of masts and visiting cruise ships. Beyond Port Hercule is Monte Carlo’s Belle Époque Casino and Hotel de Paris with its cellar that stretches all the way to The Hermitage.

I digress, back to The Library: Surely this must be what Roald Dahl’s Charlie and The Chocolate Factory felt like when he won the golden ticket. How like a child in a sweet shop I am at The Princess Grace Irish Library, which houses the weight of a linguist Irish history. And like a daily communicant, I thumb Yeats’ 1928 edition of The Tower, so like a benediction of sorts I revisit Sailing to Byzantium, first read looking towards Dalkey Island whilst at school, writing the twists of my first poems in copybook margins. Out of the corner of my eye, I spy a Dennis Johnston spine and Monk Gibbon’s Mount Ida catches light as he did cycling by Sandycove post box, where he and Sheelagh Richard’s would converge on bicycles sending news to beyond.

Having grown up swimming under the shadow of Joyce’s Tower in Sandycove, it is not surprising that it was not until I reached water at Larvotto Beach that I felt earthed. To my east, Yeats’ first burial ground Roquebrune-Cap-Martin stretches before me. It is also where the Irish born pioneer of modern design and architecture, Eileen Grey built E.1027. She is regarded as one of the most influential designers of the twentieth century together with Marcel Breuer, Alvar Aalto and Charles Eames, to name but a few. Further on is Menton where Katherine Mansfield lived, Beckett visited in 1947, and Agatha Christe wrote in the First Marquis of Milford Haven’s house. On a clear day, I can see Italy and what was out of sight, had to be visited. The first journeying out was an Easter Saturday boarder crossing to San Remo, with MC Sullivan’s Clan which was a magical Kodak adventure.

Back to Monaco, where Robert Service, who gave the world The Shooting of Dan McGrew lived from 1912, whilst Vita Sackville-West wintered there in 1918-20.

West of Monaco lies the road to Cannes. Cap d’Ail is the first port of call where Garbo swam and Churchill holidayed. One the greatest travel writers, Bruce Chatwin died in Nice in 1909. Noel Coward visited Maugham on Cap Ferrat, whilst F. Scott Fitzgerald languished in Antibes. And finally, to Cannes, where screen legends and mere mortals pilgrimage to.

During the course of my residency I had the novel luxury of time to write, to read and to explore. I also facilitated four Creative Writing Workshops, three for the Friends and Trustees of The Library and one with students from Lycée Albert Ier. What a delightful pleasure it was to meet and work with Madame Elizabeth Gondeau and her students. I was struck by their high level of comprehension, standard of fluency and the linguist inventiveness they exhibited whilst not engaging with their mother-tongue. We explored their world of poetics through a series of writing exercises which provided a wonderful opportunity to introduce them to the poetry of their Irish contemporaries from Loreto Abbey Dalkey, Co. Dublin. This cross-cultural exchange of young adults’ poetry shows us that though location and native language differs, the emotional realms of the human spirit is the same the world over.

I am deeply indebted to Mike Fitzgerald and The Ireland Fund of Monaco for this very privileged opportunity to work at The Princess Grace Irish Library in the realms of such august bound company, for their generosity of spirit in preserving an Irish Literary Heritage on Grimaldi Rock and for the sacred space to create.