A Little Bit of Haven

How artists and writers thrive tax free on the Emerald Isle

Ireland has long specialized in the export (sometimes mixed) of fine whisky and great writers. For every Swift, Synge or Yeats who stayed at home, there was a Wilde, Shaw or Beckett who packed off to escape artistic repression at the hands of what fellow Expatriate James Joyce called "a priestridden Godforsaken race."

Not a happy image, that. So in 1969 an alarmed Charles Haughey, then Ireland's Finance Minister, set out to change it. His idea: a law that would make it profitable for talented Irishmen to stay put --and for talented foreigners to immigrate--by granting tax exemptions on income from creative work. In the eight years since Haughey steered his unique bill into law, 978 people have applied for tax relief. More than 600, including 100 foreigners, have been greatly relieved.

"I wanted to say to writers, artists and other creative people that we valued their contributions, that they were important in the community," Haughey recalls. "I also felt that if we could attract important artists, they could gather around them young Irish artists and establish centers of creativity." Touring Ireland, TIME Correspondent Dean Fischer found little indication as yet of any such cultural renaissance. But Haughey's notion of a permanent tax holiday for artists has at least stopped the drain of home-grown talent.

Moreover, it has lured a heterogeneous non-Irish group of serious artists, amiable bohemians and well-heeled habitues of the bestseller lists. A sampling:

J.P. Donleavy Like Joyce, Donleavy, 51, has seen his work banned in Ireland for obscenity; unlike Joyce, he seems not to care. The Brooklyn-born author (The Ginger Man, The Unexpurgated Code) has assumed Irish citizenship and settled in permanently. "The tax exemption was the reason," he says. For the past five years, he and his wife M.W. (for Mary Wilson) have lived in a 25-room Queen Anne mansion set in 200 secluded acres in County Westmeath. Except for doing some outdoor work to keep fit, Donleavy avoids farm chores and writes for a steady five hours a day. He behaves, he says, "like a gentleman writer instead of a drudge. Being a drudge is quite damaging." Although he entertains frequently, Donleavy prefers isolation. "I'm always on the verge of securing some land for a cemetery from the local planning commission," says he. "I've always wanted to be able to offer some of my friends a place to be buried. I guess that's the ultimate indication of one's intentions."

Edward Delaney Eight years ago, Sculptor Delaney, now 44, owed $24,000 to the Irish tax collector and was preparing to emigrate to the U.S. Then the Haughey bill was passed. Delaney stayed, and Ireland retained one of its more colorful national assets. In his roisterous youth, Delaney was famed for pub crawls with Brendan Behan and for having been expelled from Dublin's National College of Art ("Inspiration didn't automatically come to me between 9 and 5"). Today in his Dublin studio and on his stony ocean-front farm in County Galway, Delaney fashions sculptures from scrap bronze that he has melted down. "In the long run," he says, "the public will benefit if the artist's output is greater." As a gesture of appreciation, he is teaching young Irish sculptors how to cast their work.

Frederick Forsyth With three phenomenal successes behind him, Novelist Forsyth (The Day of the Jackal, The Odessa File, The Dogs of War) at 39 has sworn off writing. "It's a grind, a sweat," he says. A Briton, Forsyth left England in 1974 to escape having to pay an 83% tax on royalties. After a year in Spain, he and his Ulster-born wife Carrie settled in Ireland, where they bought and refurbished Kilgarron, an 18th century manor house surrounded by 25 acres of woodland in County Wicklow. When things are dull, the Forsyths go to Dublin or London, but they are usually happy to stay at home, playing tennis, clearing the land or feeding their turkeys and chickens. "Country life," he says, "is very consuming."

Arthur Armstrong In 1969 Irish Artist Armstrong ended a losing seven-year struggle with the Dublin tax authorities; it seems that he kept artistically inaccurate records of his brush-and-easel expenses. Now spared the drudgery of bookkeeping, Bachelor Armstrong, 53, ambles through an unhurried life of painting ("There is a limit to the amount you can produce to satisfy yourself) and making the rounds in Dublin. "You can get to know everybody here," says he. "In London, there's too much territory to cover."

Armstrong's semiabstract paintings of Ireland's wild west coast sell for about $800 in Dublin and as much as three times that abroad.

Malcolm MacDonald "If you need the theater and city lights," says English Novelist MacDonald, 45, "this isn't a very appealing life. You have to be able to live on your inner resources." He, his German-born wife Ingrid and their two daughters do just that in a dilapidated Edwardian house in County Offaly that they bought three years ago and have been refurbishing ever since. MacDonald's success came suddenly in 1974, when runaway sales of his novel World from Rough Stones sent the family scurrying from British taxes. At first he felt guilty about paying no taxes. But the $25,000 he spends annually in wages to local workers has eased his doubts. "It was the exemption that brought us here," he concedes, "but if it were rescinded, we'd stay. Life here is much more congenial than in England."

Richard Condon Solitude, not tax relief, brought Novelist Condon and his wife Evelyn to Ireland in 1970 (as an American, he must pay U.S. taxes even though he lives abroad). A former pressagent, Condon, 62, boasts average book sales of 1.3 million and has sold five novels (including The Manchurian Candidate) to Hollywood. Currently he is writing political novel No. 12, to be called Death of a Politician. In his salmon pink 19-room mansion in Kilkenny, Condon works on his potboilers seven hours a day, seven days a week for ten weeks at a stretch.

Condon claims that he was "spiritually conditioned to come to Ireland. Here the writer has the same status as priests."

Despite all its economic attractions, life in Ireland remains lonely and provincial, virtually bereft of the intellectual stimulation that goads most novelists and playwrights. Thus British Novelist Len Deighton (The Ipcress File; Billion Dollar Brain) maintains a residence in Ireland solely for tax purposes but spends most of his time in Portugal.

Curiously, in a country where other people pay high income taxes (as much as 50% in the $20,000 range), the privileged status of artists and writers has not raised much criticism, a fact that British Thriller Writer Peter Driscoll (The Wilby Conspiracy) attributes to the Irishman's traditional admiration for flimflam.

Says he:"The idea that a particular group of people should be exempt from taxation is anomalous. In England, it would arouse antagonism. Here the idea seems to be that if you can get away with something, then good luck to you." -

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