Patrick Leigh Fermor (1915-2011) was known for his fascinating tales of travel to far-off lands. He was also familiar with Ireland, having visited the country many times and had a long association with Lismore in Country Waterford. I have just written an Irish Diary in the Irish Times newspaper about his links with Ireland. Read it here.
Photograph of Patrick Leigh Fermor. Image source.
The letters that Fermore and Deborah Cavendish (Debo Duchess of Devonshire, owner of Lismore castle) exchanged other over the years offer great insight into their friendship and their impressions of Lismore and Ireland. Formor
used his travel-writing skills to great aplomb in his letters. It's
amazing to see him liken the Blackwater which runs alongside the castle
to the mighty Zambezi and the Limpopo in Africa. This was on account of
the bird-life and fish present and the trees "so thick with ferns and
parasites and so looped and festooned with creepers".
In a letter to Enrica (Ricki) Huston (1929-1969) in June 1961, Fermor described the walk which skirts the Blackwater and can run for a mile or two straight as a "diminishing vista like a watery Champs Elysées". One of my favourite anecdotes about his time in Ireland is where he recounts visiting a house in the woods and being given tea, Guinness and currant-buns. Afterwards, he thumbed a lift back to the castle in a lorry. I'm sure that lorry driver had a story to tell afterwards about his unusual passenger.
