The Wild-Bird Child

Description

She has become a legend: brilliant, personable and passionate, she is arguably the most gifted of all Irish women writers of Christian literature.

During the time of the Raj in India she discovered a custom of the time where children were ‘married to gods’ and so introduced to a life of prostitution. With a mixture of courage and heartbreak she began to uncover the facts, sometimes under disguise, for the Government. After Independence the Indian Government courageously prohibited the practice by law. She and her colleagues provided a safe home for these children against awesomely difficult circumstances at Dohnavur In South India. She wrote 35 books during her life.

Amy Carmichael, Christian missionary, social reformer and writer once described herself as a “Wild-bird child and in no wise tame”: Her life proved her observation to be hauntingly accurate. Millions of people have been influenced by her life and writing. For this biography, the first by anyone from her home County, Derick Bingham carefully researched Amy Carmichael’s original letters now placed by the Dohnavur Fellowship and Miss Margret Wilkinson in the Northern Ireland Public Records Office. As he tried to uncover the heart and conscience of this extraordinarily self-effacing legend he is on record as saying that it proved to be one of the greatest spiritual experiences of his life.