Michael Murphy’s search for meaning

Broadcaster and psychoanalyst, Michael Murphy, will bring his evening of reflection: ‘Stories, Poetry and Dreams to the Triskel, Christchurch next week and ahead of the event, Colette Sheridan talks to him about his work, his books and his outlo.

BROADCASTER, psychoanalyst and writer, Michael Murphy, says that his prostate cancer, which was diagnosed in 2007, can partly be explained by “emotional wounds”.

Growing up in Castlebar, Co Mayo, he was beaten by his late father, such that at the age of three and a half, Michael gathered his pyjamas and moved into his grandmother’s home next door.

“I knew I wouldn’t survive if I stayed,” says Michael.

“The layering of the various woundings builds up over a period of time and it can be toxic.”

He subsequently reconciled with his father, but the violence was never mentioned.

“I did discuss it with my mother (who is aged 94 and is living in a nursing home) and she said my father was generally drunk when he beat me.”

In his show, ‘Stories, Poetry and Dreams’, based on his three books, Michael (67) lays bare his life, with all its ups and downs. He is joined on stage by former RTÉ colleagues, Eileen Dunne, Emer O’Kelly, Eamon Lawlor and Ciana Campbell, who are also his good friends.

But if this sounds like an exercise in self-indulgence, the show broadens out to tell the tales of other survivors of cancer, as well as being a celebration of life and love and poetry.

“The theme of surviving cancer runs through the show,” says Michael.

“The stories of two wonderful women that I met in Spain are in the show. One of them, Helen, had a brain tumour, but she upped sticks in Ireland and headed off to Andalucia, having never been in southern Spain before.

“She started a new life there and is in her early 60s now. The other woman is Anna, who’s Danish. She survived breast cancer and she also moved to Spain.”

Michael and his partner of 30 years, Terry O’Sullivan, visit Spain as often as possible. They had an apartment there, but sold it two years ago. They stay in “the West Wing” of Anna’s spacious house in Elviria, near Marbella, where Michael writes. His best-selling memoir, At Five in the Afternoon, sold 10,000 copies in Ireland. It speaks honestly about cancer.

Michael recalls an inquisitive man in the audience of his show in the Pavilion Theatre, in Dun Laoghaire.

“He asked me if my sexual function had come back. There was an audible intake of breath in the theatre. I said that it hadn’t. I’m quite honest about these things.

“The show we do is an incredibly truthful evening. One of the things that cancer taught me is that there’s no point in hiding, particularly in a small country like Ireland, where everybody knows everybody anyway.”

As a busy psychoanalyst, in a Dublin practice that he shares with Terry, Michael has undergone psychoanalysis himself.

“I was in psychoanalysis myself for 20 years. I think Woody Allen did 27 years. I did all sorts; Freudian, Lacanian and Jungian. So there are many tools in the arsenal, at this stage.

“People who have gone through analysis have a very different understanding of life. I think everyone could do with it.

“It’s important to know what’s driving you. If somebody presses a particular button, the two-year-old can come out in all of us.

“If you know what’s triggering those things, it makes your life a little easier. It certainly changes your way of thinking and if you decide to change your behaviour, you can do that.”

But no amount of psychoanalysis can soften the sharp blow of a cancer diagnosis.

“When I got cancer, it was the first time I faced my mortality. You hear death knocking on the door.

“Life is never the same after it. It’s different, because the normal trust you have in life is gone. There are no guarantees anymore. You have a different outlook. Some of my clients, particularly the women who’ve had breast cancer or cervical cancer, echo exactly the same thing.”

Michael’s health is now “very good. I’m above the ground, which is half the battle. My health regime is no more than anyone else’s, but I avoid too many sweet things,” he says.

“Certainly, in the initial stages of cancer you have to be absolutely ruthless about your health. That has to come first. You live according to the dictates of your body and that can mean not wanting to see people or go out. You can relax the regime later on.”

The consolations of religion are not an option for Michael. “Over the years, religion has utterly faded away for me. I would think that the whole attitude to the gay thing is ridiculous.

“Interestingly enough, my mother, who would be very religious and was born back in 1920, thinks the sexual morality of the Catholic Church is nonsensical. She was fine when I came out (in his late 20s.)”

One of the questions that Michael deals with in At Five in the Afternoon is how to be a man.

“Being a man is essentially a symbolic position. There are many variations. You don’t have to be a beer-swilling, GAA-playing staunch Catholic.

“The images we were presented with when we were growing up are really irrelevant at this stage. How a man exists today is a whole new world.

“The mythology underpinning it all is the ordering principle. A man puts order on things and isn’t as concerned with detail as a woman would be.

“Women are more concerned with relationships, whereas men would be more concerned with getting projects done. The masculine question is essentially the Hamlet question — to be or not to be.

“It’s to do with being. From my experience of working with women in analysis, it’s more to do with relationships. That’s what they give to their children, even if they have boys. Mothers contribute a softening of the edges.”

Michael met his life partner when he was doing an RTÉ programme on the Rutland Centre, which Terry co-founded.

“Terry is a colossal support. He comes down to Cork with me every Thursday, where I do a psychology slot on the Today programme. “He’s essentially the manager of the show we tour.

“He’s a great organiser. In the show, we finish with a very important poem. It’s called ‘A Poem for Terry’ and it says how much he is valued and what the meaning of love is,” Michael says.

Unfortunately, Terry’s health is not good. He has the after-effects of polio and his mobility has deteriorated. In 2011, Michael registered a civil partnership with Terry. Getting married isn’t an issue for the couple, who don’t have children. Michael is hopeful that the marriage equality referendum will be passed in May.

“Certainly, the younger generation can’t understand what the difficulty is. You hear some extraordinary remarks coming from some of the bishops but, to be fair, that has been counteracted by the Archbishop of Dublin, who is much more temperate. But it’s so irrelevant, all of that Church doctrine. It’s the same in the Muslim religion and others.

“I think, whatever does not support your life and wish you well should be gotten rid of. Life is short.”

Michael attributes “tolerance and trust” to the longevity of his relationship with Terry. Each would give their life for the other, he says.

Retirement hasn’t crossed Michael’s mind. He could hardly believe that RTÉ wasn’t going to renew his contract when he hit 65.

“I want to continue with the writing. And as long as I continue to be interested in human nature, I intend to keep on psychoanalysis.”

Michael’s books and his show are a way of making sense of the world. “You won’t actually know what it was all about until that final full stop goes in. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to look back on it; somebody else will do that.”

And is that full stop really final? “Yeah. I think so. That’s it. But you’ll have been able to contribute to the wonderful gift of life that will continue to flow on for other people.”

* ‘Stories, Poetry and Dreams’, an intimate evening with Michael Murphy and friends, is at Cork’s Triskel Christchurch on March 27.