The Irish writer cycled mountains and deserts, but her biggest legacy is a reminder that people are fundamentally good
There was no more perfect book to read in the early months of lockdown than Full Tilt, Dervla Murphy’s famous account of her solo bicycle ride from Ireland to India.
I bought a battered copy with a 1980s cover on eBay and used it as a prompt to dream of travel when travel itself was not possible. Murphy, who died a week ago at the age of 90, at her home in Lismore in Ireland, undertook her most well-known journey in 1963, fulfilling an ambition she had held since she was 10. She arrived in India in July 1963. I think of Murphy often. The reasons are largely sentimental, which, you can only surmise from her writing, she would have detested. She is one of the least sentimental writers I have ever read and her straightforwardness is part of her brilliance.
