Louise Cognard

Five years ago, I sailed on a two-masted ship that transported goods by sail. This vessel—let’s call it G.—was built in 1916. It traveled to the Caribbean and Central America to load the equivalent of two shipping containers of coffee, spices, and a few barrels of alcohol. By comparison, Marius, the container ship for the residency, can carry up to 2,500 containers.

For nine months, I carried my microphone into every corner of the schooner, from the galley to the engine room. The sailors on board shared their motivations, ideals, and the challenges of working around the clock in the unique rhythm of watch shifts. We talked about the ship’s hierarchical yet deeply supportive culture. We even discussed dreams at sea—far more vivid than those on land. These recordings became a radio documentary for RTS. But what about life on a container ship?

Sailing aboard Marius places me on the other side, on the ship we used to watch through binoculars from G. I want to weave together the words of sailors, revealing the two faces of the same coin: maritime trade. I want to tell the story—the engines humming, a cigarette lighting up, the radar alarm, the voices on the radio—of a transatlantic crossing on Marius, as a second chapter echoing my first voyage aboard a schooner.

This maritime residency also offers a room of one’s own, an ideal writing space, as Virginia Woolf described. In 2020, when I boarded G., I wanted to defy the absurdity of modern life. But I also felt like I was playing at a world that no longer existed. In fact, the ship no longer exists. Its end was tragic. G. sank last May. I have started writing its story so that this ship of adventurers does not fade into oblivion.

In the fall of 2025, I will board Marius in France for a six-week voyage to New Caledonia.

Marius was built in 2018—more than a century after G. first touched the water. A century that witnessed the explosive expansion of maritime trade. Can traces of G. still be found in the corridors and passageways of Marius? Do the ship’s architecture and objects carry echoes of the past? The sails are gone, but might there still be shackles? Discharge ports? Mooring lines? What has changed between the ships of the last century and today’s vessels? What has disappeared entirely?

This maritime residency will be a space for exploring the second chapter of my audio documentary on the maritime world, as well as an ideal setting for writing my first novel. I will be aboard a “brother in trade” of G., on the same route, making the same Atlantic crossing before continuing into the Pacific. I will be able to take a step back from the beatnik I once was on the schooner—to heal my wounds or reopen them: the heartbreak of a sailor and the wreck of a ship. Telling the story of this anachronistic vessel from an ultra-modern cargo ship will undoubtedly stir the waters and bring salt to my writing.