Deyá nestles between the Mediterranean and the abrupt wall of the Teix on the precipitous pine and olive-clad north coast of Mallorca. Of its some 400 inhabitants, roughly one quarter are foreigners who have either retired or dropped out and opted for a sunny, leisurely island existence.

During the winter months life is placid, and a good deal of writing and painting is accomplished by the village's permanent artists' colony. The only social gathering place is the terrace of Las Palmeras bar when it is sunny, or inside when it is not. All of that changes in June when the summer contingent commences drifting in from England, France, Germany, Northern Europe, and the United States. By mid-summer the population has quadrupled, social life takes on a frenetic rhythm, and daytime activity centers on Cala Deyá, the boulder-clogged beach some two kilometers away with its untidy sprawl of boathouses, beached fishing boats and pleasure craft, a small thatched cafe and a terrace restaurant perched above the inlet. The permanent residents are forced to adopt stern measures to maintain any semblance of productivity inasmuch as everyone else assumes that all Deyá is on vacation the year around.

The austere stone houses of the village fill with more writers, painters, television producers, folk and rock artists, theatrical people, and a mixed bag of charter flight jet setters who doze on the Cala rocks by day and attend each other's white wine bashes by night.