On a wing and a prayer in West Cork

IT is 22 years since I came back to live in West Cork and 20 years since I began to write this column.

It’s been a pleasure to write, every instalment of it and, happily, it seems to have given pleasure to my readers too.

The world around me has been the inspiration and not only events in local nature but in the outdoor world wherever I go. Readers will know that reports from home have been interspersed with dispatches from far-flung places.

Now, I have the pleasure of bringing out a new book, published by Gill & Macmillan, a collection of pieces from the columns interleaved with stories never told, all gathered under the title of The Kindness of Place: Twenty Years in West Cork.

While West Cork figures most prominently in the geography of the book, the comings and goings of its flora and fauna is repeated in most parts of Ireland. We have, of course, the occasional unique phenomenon, like the arrival of a 66ft-long fin whale in the bay.

Such local high spots get their mention, but the bluebells in April, the butterflies of high summer, the mushrooms and toadstools of autumn and the migrant birds of winter feature everywhere on our island, and my comments upon them find a resonance in all counties, as letters from readers attest.

It was a joy to revisit the 20 years of weekly writings when selecting subjects and passages. All had to fashioned to their new role as part of a book, the comments of one year bridged to meld with those of another, so that the text would read as an unbroken narrative, flowing and fresh.

Much of the content has not been written before (including an end piece entitled The Heron Diaries, recounting the rearing of ‘our’ foundling heron) for the book records not only the passage of nature and rural life month by month in a typical year, but also how your columnist and his family survived.

We arrived back in Ireland in autumn 1989 —I had been away for 32 years — optimistic but unrealistic, sure that we would manage somehow.

As it turned out, we were immensely fortunate. Indeed, throughout the years, a guardian angel of untiring patience has accompanied us. But for him or her, we might have long since sunk into penury and re-emigrated, or I might have sunk in the slob while in search of shellfish to supplement the fare.

While we never came close to homelessness or starvation, our good fortune seemed, indeed, miraculous and undeserved. I was invited to contribute to the Irish Examiner (a milestone in my writing career), my early dispatches being collected and carried to Academy Street by the Evening Echo delivery van.

We renovated a derelict courthouse with the help of an opera singer and set up a language school, teaching students from all over the globe. We moved house six times, each time, somehow, advantageously, although necessity was always the cause.

When my father died, we took on a guest house because it enabled us to offer my mother, then very feeble, a comfortable home until she passed away.

Afterwards, we moved on, and my wife was able to again devote her time to her language students, and to supply teaching at far-flung schools when an incumbent teacher fell sick.

Meanwhile, the boys attended primary school and college, and did well, and I penned a series of walking guides, wrote and presented some TV documentaries, and wrote A Place Near Heaven: A Year in West Cork, which some of my readers will have read and which received generous reviews.

This new book, The Kindness of Place, follows the same format. It, also, is illustrated by Nevil Swinchatt, a fine hand with a pen.

Tim Severin, explorer and writer internationally acclaimed for his unique book, The Brendan Voyage, has graciously agreed to launch it (who more appropriate than a sailor?). The event will take place at O’Donovan’s Hotel, Clonakilty, Co Cork, at 7pm next Thursday, June 17.

Readers and friends, old and new, are very welcome. Tim will ‘launch’, I will read a few extracts and we will all enjoy a glass of wine. Meanwhile, for those who cannot attend, The Kindness of Place: Twenty Years in West Cork is available at all good bookshops and on the web.