Dervla Murphy Irish author of adventure travel books who wrote for more than 50 years has died aged 90. Murphy wrote many fascinating accounts about her travels overland on cycling trips through Ireland to India, through Europe, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.
In 1968 spurred on by romantic childhood memories of names such as Prester John, the Queen of Sheba and the Lion of Judah and a vision of Ethiopia as “beautiful, dangerous and mysterious”, she went against official advice to make a considered hazardous journey through Ethiopia in the company of an amiable pack-mule, Jock. During the gruelling trek through remote regions she was robbed three times, yet found the Ethiopian highlanders to be mostly hospitable and her dependence on them, and increasing familiarity with their way of life, broke down barriers between them.
On reaching Addis Ababa she concluded that this growth of affection for another race “is the real achievement of such a journey”, and the book provides an insight into the uniqueness of Ethiopia and Ethiopians at a time before tourism to Ethiopia had been properly developed.
It is as good a read today as it was when it was first written in 1969.
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