Dervla Murphy was born and raised in Lismore, County Waterford. Her parents were from Dublin and had moved to Lismore when her father was appointed county librarian. When Murphy was one year old, her mother developed rheumatoid arthritis, from which she suffered for the rest of her life. They were advised not to have any more children, and Dervla grew up as an only child. From a young age, Murphy planned to travel:

For my tenth birthday my parents gave me a second-hand bicycle and Pappa [her grandfather] sent me a second-hand atlas. Already I was an enthusiastic cyclist, though I had never before owned a bicycle, and soon after my birthday I resolved to cycle to India one day. I have never forgotten the exact spot, on a steep hill near Lismore, where this decision was made. Half-way up I rather proudly looked at my legs, slowly pushing the pedals around, and the thought came "If I went on doing this for long enough I could get to India."

Murphy attended secondary school at the Ursuline Convent in Waterford, but left at age 14 to take care of her disabled mother. During her young adulthood she took a number of short trips (between 3 and 6 weeks): to Wales and Southern England in 1951; to Belgium, Germany, and France in 1952; and two trips to Spain in 1954 and 1956. She published a number of travel articles in the Hibernia journal and the Irish Independent newspaper, but her Spanish travel book was rejected by publishers.

Murphy's first lover, Godfrey, died abroad in 1958 and her father became unexpectedly ill with nephritis, a complication of influenza, and died in February 1961. Her mother's health had been deteriorating for many years, and she died in August 1962. Her mother's death freed Murphy from her domestic duties and allowed her to make the extended trip for which she had long planned:

The hardships and poverty of my youth had been a good apprenticeship for this form of travel. I had been brought up to understand that material possessions and physical comfort should never be confused with success, achievement and security.

Murphy published an autobiography Wheels within Wheels in 1979, describing her life before the journey described in Full Tilt.

Full Tilt and other early writings

In 1963, Murphy set off on her first long-distance bicycle tour - a self-supported trip from Ireland to India. Taking a pistol along with other equipment aboard Roz, her Armstrong Cadet bicycle, she passed through Europe during one of the worst winters in years. In Yugoslavia, Murphy began to write a journal instead of mailing letters. In Iran she used her gun to frighten off a group of thieves, and "used unprintable tactics" to escape from an attempted rapist at a police station. She received her worst injury of the journey on a bus in Afghanistan, when a rifle butt hit her and fractured three ribs; however, this only delayed her for a short while. She wrote appreciatively about the landscape and people of Afghanistan, calling herself "Afghanatical" and claiming that the Afghan "is a man after my own heart." In Pakistan, she visited Swat (where she was a guest of the last wali, Miangul Aurangzeb) and the mountain area of Gilgit. The final leg of her trip took her through the Punjab region and over the border to India towards Delhi. Her journal was later published by John Murray as her first book Full Tilt: Ireland to India with a Bicycle.

After arriving in Delhi, Murphy volunteered to work with Tibetan refugees under the auspices of Save the Children. She spent five months in a refugee camp in Dharamsala run by Tsering Dolma, sister of the 14th Dalai Lama. She then cycled through the Kullu Valley, spending Christmas in Malana. Her journals for this time were published in her second book, Tibetan Foothold.

On returning to Europe, Murphy took part in a fundraising campaign for Save the Children, and in 1965 she worked with another group of Tibetan refugees in Pokhara, Nepal (described in The Waiting Land).

In 1966, Murphy made her first trip to Africa. She travelled to Ethiopia and walked with a pack mule from Asmara to Addis Ababa, confronted by Kalashnikov-carrying soldiers on the way. This journey was described in her fourth book, In Ethiopia with a Mule.

Travels with Rachel

Murphy's daughter Rachel accompanied her on a trip to India at the age of five; they flew into Bombay and traveled to Goa and Coorg (described in On a Shoestring to Coorg). The pair later journeyed to Baltistan (Where the Indus is Young), South America (Eight Feet in the Andes), and Madagascar (Muddling through in Madagascar). Their last trip was through Cameroon on a horse, where Dervla was frequently mistaken for Rachel's husband (Cameroon with Egbert).

On traveling with a child, she wrote:

A child's presence emphasises your trust in the community's goodwill. And because children pay little attention to racial or cultural differences, junior companions rapidly demolish barriers of shyness or apprehension often raised when foreigners unexpectedly approach a remote village.

Politicization

In 1978, Murphy wrote A Place Apart, about her travels in Northern Ireland and encounters with members of the Protestant and Catholic religious communities. She credits her 1982 book Race to the Finish? The Nuclear Stakes as a turning point which led her to write more about political issues. Her writings include discussions about race relations in Bradford and Birmingham (Tales From Two Cities), AIDS (The Ukimwi Road), the aftermath of apartheid (South from the Limpopo) and the Rwandan genocide (Visiting Rwanda), the displacement of tribal peoples (One Foot in Laos), and post-war reconstruction of the Balkans (Through the Embers of Chaos). She is anti-globalization and critical of NATO, the World Bank, the IMF, and the World Trade Organisation. She has spoken out against nuclear power and climate change.

Murphy stated that some readers disapproved of the "political stuff", but another group "tells me they haven't thought about these things in this way before and are glad that I've written and thought more about the political side. My view is that I have these things I want to say and I don't really care if it spoils a pure travel book."

"Irish babushka"

In 2002, aged 71, Murphy planned to cycle in the Ussuriland region of eastern Russia. She broke her knee while on the Baikal Amur Mainline railway, then tore a calf while recuperating at Lake Baikal and her plans changed to a journey around Siberia by train, boat and bus, documented in Through Siberia by Accident. She revisited Siberia and wrote a companion book, Silverland. In 2005, she visited Cuba with her daughter and three granddaughters, and made two returning trips in 2006 and 2007 (described in The Island that Dared).

Murphy never married. In 1968 she gave birth to her only child, Rachel, fathered by Irish Times journalist Terence de Vere White. Her decision to raise her daughter alone was described as "a brave choice in 1960s Ireland" by The Sunday Business Post, although she said she felt safe from criticism because she was in her 30s and was financially and professionally secure. Following Rachel's birth, she spent five years as a book reviewer before returning to travel writing.

Murphy lives in Lismore with five dogs and three cats. She is a patron of Sustrans, a British charity for sustainable travel and of the Lismore Immrama Festival of Travel Writing.

In 2009 Murphy appeared on the BBC Radio 4 programme Great Lives, nominating Freya Stark as a Great Life, supported by expert John Murray VII of the publishing family.

• Full Tilt: Ireland to India With a Bicycle, 1965.
• Tibetan Foothold, 1966.
• The Waiting Land: A Spell in Nepal, 1967.
• In Ethiopia with a Mule, 1968.
• On a Shoestring to Coorg: An Experience of South India, 1976.
• Where the Indus is Young: A Winter in Baltistan, 1977.
• A Place Apart, 1978.
• Wheels Within Wheels (autobiography), 1979.
• Race to the Finish? The Nuclear Stakes, 1982.
• Eight Feet in the Andes: Travels With a Mule in Unknown Peru, 1983.
• Muddling through in Madagascar, 1985.
• Changing the Problem: Post-forum Reflections, 1985.
• Ireland, Orbis, 1985.
• Tales From Two Cities: Travels of Another Sort, 1987.
• Cameroon With Egbert, 1990.
• Transylvania and Beyond, 1993.
• The Ukimwi Road: From Kenya to Zimbabwe, 1995.
• Visiting Rwanda, 1998.
• South From the Limpopo: Travels Through South Africa, 1999.
• One Foot in Laos, 2001
• Through the Embers of Chaos: Balkan Journeys, 2003.
• Through Siberia by Accident, 2005.
• Silverland: A Winter Journey Beyond the Urals, 2006
• The Island That Dared, 2008 (Travels in Cuba)

Profiles

• Profile at Irish Writers Online
• The First Lady of Irish Cycling

Book reviews

• The Perils of Dervla Murphy Clifford L. Graves reviews Full Tilt, The Best of Bicycling, Jan 1969
• Not a person to murder Barbara Trapido reviews South From The Limpopo, The Spectator, Oct 4, 1997
• Peddling Strong Views on Laos Alain Gilloux reviews One Foot in Laos, Asiaweek, July 14, 2000
• On a Shoestring to Coorg Shriram Krishnamurthi reviews On a Shoestring to Coorg, Brown University, Feb 2005
• The intrepid Irish babushka Rory Maclean reviews Silverland, The Telegraph, Nov 26, 2006
• Cuba on the cusp of change JS Tennant reviews The Island that Dared, Irish Times, Oct 18, 2008

Interviews

• Trailblazer Joanne Hayden, Sunday Business Post, Aug 18, 2002
• Free wheeler Nicholas Wroe, The Guardian, Apr 15, 2006
• On Top of the World Vicky Allan, Sunday Herald, Jan 20, 2007
• Interview with Dervla Murphy Rachel Moffat, Studies in Travel Writing website, 2009
• The Light of Lismore - The Saturday Interview: Dervla Murphy Irish Times, 20 February 2010

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