Writers' Retreat in the Bordeaux forest
The writing base of The Big Picture is in Caussarieu (right), a 300-year-old foresters’ property with 5 acres of gardens, forest, nature reserve and river-frontage outside Sauternes, in the Bordeaux vineyard region. Before Covid, Hoffman provided a retreat centre there for visiting writers. It’s now the base for her own intensive travel, research and writing output, and that of her husband, medical scientist and public health expert Dr Richard Hoffman, who has written three books there. His articles for the public at the online platform The Conversation have reached over 1.8 million readers.
They made the land at Caussarieu part of a nature reserve that's now being Rewilded in partnership with the French Environment Agency. After Year 1, they produced a Flora & Fauna Inventory. In 2024, Year 5 will yield the publication of Marella Hoffman’s book Les Voix de la Forêt ~ Façonner l’Avenir Ensemble dans Un Village du Sud Gironde (Voices of the Forest ~ Shaping a Future Together in a South Gironde Village). Addressing issues that are both local and global, the book reflects how being immersed in the largest forest in Western Europe has shaped her thinking and writing.
Caussarieu, meaning Bridge over the River in the local Gascon dialect, has been the property’s name for centuries. It's now a place for serious thinking about the problems facing society in the times ahead. The forthcoming book extends Hoffman’s previous work to view the community and landscape in the valley as a microcosm of dilemmas that are facing the whole planet. It gives direct voice to dilemmas of power and democracy between the humans and the 33 rare and threatened animal species who still inhabit the valley today.
The paintings below - plus dozens of others - were gifted to the Writers’ Centre by Bordeaux artist Marie-Anne Bernaulte, who painted there for decades before selling it to the Hoffmans (seated on the left at the celebration to hand over the keys, left). Now painting at the Bordeaux coast, Marie-Anne sometimes returns to discuss the works she created at Caussarieu.
