Selina Hastings on Sybille Bedford

Throughout most of her long life, Sybille remained a keen traveller, almost constantly on the move, living in England, France, Italy, in her middle age writing many articles about her extensive journeys through Europe. Prone to anxiety, she never liked to travel alone, and was nearly always accompanied by one of a series of lovers with whom she lived over the years. While in New York Sybille had begun an affair with a woman almost fifteen years her senior, Esther Murphy, sister of Gerald Murphy, the close friend of Scott Fitzgerald. Tall, ungainly, very masculine in appearance, Esther was kind-hearted, clever and formidably well-read, given to talking for hours on end, drink and cigarette always to hand. With the war over, the two women spent hours poring over maps, examining the possibilities of South America, of Peru, Uruguay, Montevideo, all of which turned out to be far too expensive. So they settled on Mexico.

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