The project "Mirrors of Europe" is an innovative framework for enhancing cultural exchange between EU countries and selected "Third countries". It creates a mobility scheme for prominent novelists from EU states to spend time in selected Third Countries - and vice versa - and produce a 2000-3000 word essay (or similar literary format) that conveys his or her impression of the host country. The essays will subsequently be translated and published in pan-European and local online (and possibly also print) outlets. The project will involve twenty authors from twenty countries. To maximize public outreach, it makes use of the basic human desire to see oneself through the lens of others. This logic can easily be extended to societies. People are generally interested in what foreign visitors think of their country: outsiders' observations arouse interest and debate - all the more if made by prominent foreign authors, and expressed in literary language.The proposed project would be implemented by a pan-European consortium of online magazines and cultural NGOs. It will commence in November 2010, and come to a close in October 2012. Implementation comprises three main activities: first, the selection of authors, their destinations, and the common theme of the essays; second, the logistics of the authors' travels and accommodation; third, the translation and publication of essays produced as part of the project, and their effective circulation.The proposed project advances all of the three main objectives set by the EC's Culture Programme: it cross-national mobility of people working in the cultural sector; it encourages a structured circulation of their artistic products; and third, it should yield a discernible and lasting impact on the quality of inter-cultural dialogue between EU member states and "Third Countries".