“Defying The Curse” by Maria O’Rourke (published by Marble City Publishing).
As parliamentarians head for the hills at the conclusion of the debate on the King’s Speech they might consider taking with them a copy of Maria O’Rourke’s “Defying the Curse.” This is a well-crafted novel based on a true story of remarkable courage – involving the limbless youngest son of the ancient Irish MacMurrough Kavanagh family. In 1866 Arthur MacMurrough Kavanagh was elected to the House of Commons for a Wexford constituency – and later for County Carlow – as a Conservative MP.
For any of us who have Irish antecedent the story vividly recalls the horrors of the Irish Famine, the evictions by landlords, Gladstone’s attempts at land reform, and the political and religious tensions that existed between the Anglo-Irish and the indigenous impoverished population.
But it goes much deeper than that, exploring the primitive use of the curse to damn those who had hurt you; the initial response to the birth of a child with no legs or arms; the extraordinary determination to overcome the most extraordinary adversity; and the dynamics, good and bad, of family relationships.
It’s also impossible to read the accounts of how a limbless man teaches himself to ride a horse, to sail, to paint and write, to travel the world, to face extraordinary adversity, including the deaths of his three brothers, and to seek election to Parliament, and not be deeply moved. In our own time it brings to mind the heroism of Craig Mackinlay, who returned to the Commons (and now the Lords) after losing his limbs to sepsis.
Yes, this novel may be the story of the nineteenth century, but it has many lessons for today.
And it reminds us that the story of these islands is deeply interwoven. Even today, in Parliament, a descendent of Arthur Kavanagh, the maternal Le Poer Trench side of his family sits in Parliament, as a Crossbench peer. The Earl of Clancarty (Nick Trench) does admirable work for the arts and culture. I hope he get as much from Maria O’Rourke’s novel as much as I did
