Cork writer's new book gives whirlwind tour of Dervla Murphy's world-wide travels

“ONE of the greatest gifts of my life.” That is how sociologist and writer, Ethel Crowley, PhD, described her friendship with the Lismore-based pioneering writer, Dervla Murphy.

Ethel has edited a book on Dervla’s travel books and early journalism entitled Life At Full Tilt: The Selected Writings of Dervla Murphy.

Dervla, who died in May last year at the age of 90, wrote 24 books, including explorations of the Middle East and Eastern Europe.

She is best known for her first 1965 travel book, Full Tilt: Ireland to India with a Bicycle, and she wrote a much-lauded memoir, Wheels within Wheels.

Dervla absorbed so much of the countries she visited, travelling by bike, living in local communities and getting to know ordinary people.

There were hairy times including being in danger of rape and murder as well as being on buses and in cars that crashed. There was some precarious hiking in the mountains with pack animals.

But Dervla lived to tell the fascinating tales, proving herself to be a determined survivor, sussing out strangers with shrewdness and generally being lucky. She brought her daughter Rachel on some of the trips.

According to the mythology that has built up around Dervla, she carried a pistol on her travels. But Ethel says she only did that on her first trip and otherwise, probably carried a Swiss army knife.

Ethel, who was brought up on a farm in West Cork, is a seasoned traveller herself with a particular interest in Spain and its culinary culture, the subject of a book she hopes to publish.

She and her geographer husband, Jim MacLaughlin, have travelled all over the world. Ethel has a Masters on the women of the Middle East where she has spent time. She has also been to India a few times including with the HOPE Foundation.

Asked how Dervla, were she alive, might respond to the current war in Palestine and Israel in which thousands have been killed, Ethel says: “She always took a primarily humanitarian stance. She would be most concerned about the impact of the war on the poorest people and the most vulnerable, on children and mothers with nine or ten kids to take care of.

Yes, she had massive sympathy for the Palestinians as a lot of people in Ireland do. She didn’t hide that.

“She spent time in a Kibbutz. She would speak to anyone who spoke to her. In Israel, a lot of the time, people wouldn’t speak to her. They would have seen her as an interfering woman and an outsider that couldn’t be trusted. But Dervla was interested in everyone – the human stories.”

Dervla was quite reclusive, living in the former old market buildings converted into living quarters in Lismore, dating back to the 17th century. You entered her home via a big sturdy black gate and a winding gravel pathway. (This journalist had the privilege of interviewing Dervla in her home around the time of her eightieth birthday.)

Ethel’s calling card was a book she wrote called Your Place Or Mine? As she explains, it was about ideas of connection, community and identity.

“I developed an idea in that book that I called ‘active cosmopolitanism’ which was to do with really deep engagement with the world around you. It’s about not belonging to any one place but belonging to every place. 

I picked some people I thought embodied this idea. Dervla was one of them.

Ethel didn’t actually interview Dervla but devoted a section of the book to her, having read most of her travel books.

“I sent a copy of the book to Dervla and lo and behold, she rang me up. To hear Dervla Murphy’s voice for the first time at the end of my phone at eight in the morning was amazing. She invited me to her home. She liked my book and identified me as somebody worth talking to.

“When we met, it was an instant connection. It was almost a case of ‘where have you been all my life?’ I know a lot of people said that about her; she was very good at connecting with people.

“We got on so well. We’re both really direct. We also had a good sense of fun and had travelling in common. We had loads to talk about.”

Ethel and her husband, who also got on well with Dervla, visited her a lot. The first meeting was in 2013.

“Dervla was starting to slow down a bit. She had finished writing her Middle East books, so she had a bit of time. We used to have such fun. She had a razor sharp wit.”

Dervla would set herself up for the day with a big breakfast before 6am.

“She didn’t eat during the day. She viewed her body as a system and just ate all the calories she needed first thing in the morning. I never saw her eat.

She’d have a beer or two during the day and would always feed us with a bowl of soup, stew and homemade bread.

Not particularly interested in feminism, or at least, not attaching herself to that cause, Ethel says that Dervla was “so independent-minded that she would never align herself to a movement.

“She would always tease apart the threads of an argument. She was always so busy, travelling and writing that she wouldn’t have time to be associated with a movement.

“Over 50 years, she did a trip and wrote a book every two years as well as doing a lot of research. Can you imagine the discipline that took?”

At the age of 85, Dervla’s of Palestine and Israel was published. She truly was a pioneering woman.

Any royalties from the sale of the book will go to a charity chosen by Dervla Murphy.