Coffee houses celebrate Europe Day

Bewley's Café in Grafton Street joined 26 other coffee houses across Europe to celebrate Europe Day yesterday.

The Café d'Europe project involved people gathering in cafés and tavernas across the continent to talk about European issues. Writers such as Václav Havel, Timothy Garton Ash and Christiane Singer attended café events in Prague, London and France.

EU enlargement, the Irish identity and the idea of Europe as a "temptress" were topics raised at the gathering in Bewley's chaired by retired broadcaster and academic Brian Farrell.

It involved a reading from the poet and writer Anthony Cronin. He said he had been asked to talk about Europe as a temptress but was reluctant because "there have been too many temptresses and seductresses, the products of the male imagination, and they have all been disastrous".

He gave the examples of Helen of Troy, Delilah and Kitty O'Shea and said "I'm not going to add Europe to that bundle." Instead, he compared Europe to Athena, Greek goddess of wisdom.

The original plan to bring Europe together was a "remarkable and very, very noble aspiration", Mr Cronin said. However, it wasn't until the Maastricht Treaty that a culture clause was drawn up. Europe had been a body without a soul but "it definitely has a soul now", he said.

Austrian ambassador to Ireland Horst-Dieter Rennau called for more emphasis on idealism in Europe. "I am deeply convinced that consumerism does not lead to happiness," he said.

Noel Treacy, Minister of State for European Affairs, said it was fitting that the Café d'Europe event was taking place in a literary café as literature had brought Europeans together. Writers such as Homer, Dante, Shakespeare and Joyce had helped define Europe "in ways that kings and conquerors could never have done".

• A Stories of Europe book is being compiled by the organisers (the Austrian government and the Institute for Innovating Regions). People are invited to write about their feelings for Europe and send them to info@cafeeurope.at