The following is from Sophie Toscan du Plantier's diary, written when she was house-hunting in Ireland in 1992:
`Could I bear the solitude of a country like Ireland? Certainly - it resembles Lozere [the home region of both Sophie's parents]. I would like to live in the wild, like in Aubrac but with the sea into the bargain. I would like to write there, in this noisy, windy tranquillity, go there out of season, settle in for the autumn and winter . . .
The Irish are even more attached to their land than the people of Lozere. There is in them a love for their country that is almost touching, which leads them to warn you against its inconveniences. This is a land of resistance, of a flag, of more than simple roots! So there is pride and concern in the attachment of an Irishman to his land; not resignation - despite all the clarity of their sayings and proverbs. They speak of the weather with great interest and concentration, constantly assuring you that the weather of the day is unusual. I have to admit that it's very cold here at the moment.
I like this country. I am adapting to it at the same time that my body is more or less getting used to the cold. I am growing physically tougher and I feel at ease here with these people, their language and their reflections . . .
Ireland, the sky and the sea and the earth, nothing else, as far as the eye can see. Furrows in the ground where they have dug out and collected the peat. Autumn, where everything is red and green like the hair and the eyes of the Irish. Any description seems superficial compared to the reality of Ireland."