Over the past 10 years, 79 writers and artists have made the journey to Achill Island to stay in the Heinrich Boll Cottage, a white, horseshoe- shaped house surrounded by fuchsia and flax, which the German writer bought in 1958 and lived in periodically until he died in 1985.

Born into a Catholic family in Cologne in 1917, B÷ll was an independent force in a demoralised post-war Germany. A defender of dissident writers and president of the international PEN group, he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1972. His life was wracked by war - he hated Hitler but was conscripted and wounded four times - and he seemed to have found refuge in Achill. His attachment to Ireland was deep and his Irisches Tagebuch (Irish Journal), published in 1957 and translated into English 10 years later, propelled German visitors to this country, particularly to Achill.

In 1991, his widow, Annemarie, and sons RenΘ and Vincent agreed to allow the B÷ll cottage, in the secluded village of Dugort, to be used as an artists' retreat. Vital early funding for the residency programme came from Mayo County Council and the Arts Council provided further assistance in recent years. Now the B÷ll family is prepared to sell the house and surrounding land to a local voluntary group, the Achill Heinrich B÷ll Committee, which has administered the residency scheme since 1992.

"Of course, it is sad," painter RenΘ B÷ll, the writer's son, said of the proposed sale, in an e-mail from Bornheim, near Cologne. "We stayed there so many times and it's part of our youth and I still feel at home in Achill." But he doesn't visit the island as often as he would like, the house needs refurbishment and, when he does come, he said, "I want to do my own work, to paint". He added: "We think it's very important to have a place where artists can work without any restriction and/or conditions. The cottage can become even more of an international attraction and a living memory for my father."

RenΘ B÷ll wrote a letter in June agreeing to sell the cottage to the Achill Heinrich B÷ll Committee for £100,000. The group needs to raise the funds to acquire Achill's literary landmark and preserve it as an artists' residence and heritage site. The committee sent a purchase and refurbishment proposal to the Minister of State for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands, Mary Coughlan, who visited the cottage last month.

A Department spokesman told The Irish Times that the proposal was being brought to the attention of the Minister, S∅le de Valera.

Poet Paul Durcan wrote much of his collection Greetings To Our Friends In Brazil during a month-long stay in what he calls "an ex- soldier's house on the side of the big mountain". In a letter attached to the proposal he states: "The whole project of the Heinrich B÷ll Cottage is constantly validated by a sense of the presence of the original Writer Resident himself as the master author who understood the necessity of privacy and the rightness of solitude".

The effort to buy the cottage has community support. Donncha ╙ Gallchobhair, former Minister for the Gaeltacht, who lives in Curraun and is chairman of the local development company, Coiste Forbatha ┴itiuil Acla, said: "It was a great honour for Achill to have Heinrich B÷ll locate here". Terence Dever, Coiste manager, added: "The Heinrich B÷ll cottage is now recognised as an important centre for poets and writers". The Achill Heinrich B÷ll Committee chairman, Dr Edward King, said: "We have a good track record over the past 10 years in ensuring that artists can stay there in complete privacy and freedom." Dr King, one of Achill's three GPs, is continuing the work of his mother, Clodagh King, who died in 1995. She and poet John F. Deane, who was raised in Bunnacurry, initiated the B÷ll cottage scheme, along with Jack Harte and Tom McNamara.

Heinrich B÷ll was a good friend of Edward King's mother and father, Dr Ned King, "a single-handed rural practitioner who had to cope with every eventuality", according to his son. The B÷lls and the Kings "were both young parents with children roughly the same ages and spent many evenings together." B÷ll loosely based one of his stories in Irish Journal on Clodagh and Ned King. In the story, the island doctor travels on the hazardous Atlantic Drive on a stormy night to deliver a baby while his wife waits for his return. B÷ll captures the anxiety of the young doctor's wife.

Edward King remembers B÷ll on Achill as "a very gentle, somewhat shy person, a totally understated man". He wore a beret, smoked, and he and his family "walked and walked, no matter what" in their German all-weather gear. After winning the Nobel Prize, B÷ll sent a card: "Dear Clo, Dear Ned, You may imagine how happy and surprised we were when we got the news in Athens! We met Vincent in Israel, together with RenΘ and went to hide from publicity in the Sinai desert." The residency scheme has introduced Achill and the work of Heinrich B÷ll to artists from Russia, Japan, Ecuador, Switzerland, the US and Germany.

Among the many Irish participants have been writer Anne Enright, sculptor John Behan and poet Macdara Woods. Artists stay between two weeks and one month and they receive a bursary of £100 to £150 each week. Accommodation is basic but the need to upgrade is acknowledged.

There is a great silence in the B÷ll cottage and numerous former occupants have found the atmosphere conducive to work. Sabra Loomis, a poet from New York, said her stay changed her work:

"Often I sat by the road and wrote directly from landscape." She and Boston poet Kevin Bowen and his family are building a home in Cabaun, Achill, as a result of their residencies.

The B÷ll Cottage is privately owned and it is understandable that visiting artists do not wish to be disturbed. A sign outside in German and English asks for their privacy to be respected. Yet it is equally understandable that German tourists, having travelled a great distance to a remote place, may be tempted to knock on the door, and they often do. If the State buys the property, it seems the issue of public access needs to be addressed.

The residency programme is of major benefit to the island community through exhibitions, public readings, cultural events and visits to schools, John McHugh, committee secretary, noted. "A recent example is Gabriel Rosenstock, who visited several primary schools in the parish and read his poems, which are included in school text books," he said.

A stalwart group of Achill people attend readings and presentations all year long and in all weathers. Attendances swell in summer. Recent readings have been held in the Artists' Gallery, the former schoolhouse in Dugort restored by Vi McDowell.

What would Heinrich B÷ll think?

Outside his cottage, I found Claudia Rosenfeld, a German visitor from Duisburg, standing at the gate.

She immediately produced a copy of Irish Journal from her handbag. "A friendly book," she said. "He has a very specific way of writing." She had read and admired two of his novels, The Clown and The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum. When told the B÷ll family was selling the cottage, she remarked: "As a German, I think it should stay this way, as a writers' retreat, and I'm sure that is what Heinrich B÷ll would like."

Applications for 2002 residencies should be sent by the end of September to John McHugh, Secretary, Heinrich B÷ll Committee, c/o Abha Teangai, Dooagh, Achill, Co Mayo. Tel: 098-43414. Include letter of interest, CV and a short example of your work.