Glyndwr's Independence 2

Monday, October 27, 2014

Happy 100th Birthday to one our most beloved writers, Dylan Thomas.

"Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again; Though lovers be lost love shall not. And death shall have no dominion".
Happy 100th Birthday to one our most beloved writers, Dylan Thomas.

27th October

Today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Dylan Thomas.

Dylan Marlais Thomas was born on October 27 1914 at 5 Cwmdonkin Drive in Swansea.

Dylan's father was an English Literature professor at the local grammar school and would often recite Shakespeare to Thomas before he could read. He loved the sounds of nursery rhymes, foreshadowing his love for the rhythmic ballads of Hopkins, Yeats, and Poe. Although both of his parents spoke fluent Welsh, Thomas and his older sister never learned the language, and Thomas wrote exclusively in English.

Thomas was a neurotic, sickly child who shied away from school and preferred reading on his own. He read all of D. H. Lawrence's poetry, impressed by vivid descriptions of the natural world. Fascinated by language, he excelled in English and reading but neglected other subjects. He dropped out of school at sixteen to become a junior reporter for the South Wales Daily Post. By December of 1932, he left his job at the Post and decided to concentrate on his poetry full time. It was during this time, in his late teens, that Thomas wrote more than half of his collected poems.

In 1934, when Thomas was twenty, he moved to London, won the Poet's Corner book prize, and published his first book, 18 Poems, to great acclaim. The book drew from a collection of poetry notebooks that Thomas had written years earlier, as would many of his most popular books. During this period of success, Thomas also began a habit of alcohol abuse. Unlike his contemporaries, T. S. Eliot and W. H. Auden, Thomas was not concerned with exhibiting themes of social and intellectual issues, and his writing, with its intense lyricism and highly charged emotion, has more in common with the Romantic tradition. Thomas describes his technique in a letter: "I make one image—though 'make' is not the right word; I let, perhaps, an image be 'made' emotionally in me and then apply to it what intellectual & critical forces I possess—let it breed another, let that image contradict the first, make, of the third image bred out of the other two together, a fourth contradictory image, and let them all, within my imposed formal limits, conflict."

Two years after the publication of 18 Poems, Thomas met the dancer Caitlin Macnamara at a pub in London. At the time, she was the mistress of painter Augustus John. Macnamara and Thomas engaged in an affair, and married in 1937. Despite the passionate love letters Thomas would write to her, the marriage was turbulent, with rumours of both having multiple affairs. In 1940, Thomas and his wife moved to London. He had served as an anti-aircraft gunner but was rejected for more active combat due to illness. To avoid the air raids, the couple left London in 1944. They eventually settled at Laugharne, in the Boat House where Thomas would write many of his later poems.

In January 1950, at the age of thirty-five, Thomas visited America for the first time. His reading tours of the United States, which did much to popularize the poetry reading as a new medium for the art, are famous and notorious, for Thomas was the archetypal Romantic poet of the popular American imagination: he was flamboyantly theatrical, a heavy drinker, engaged in roaring disputes in public, and read his work aloud with tremendous depth of feeling and a singing Welsh lilt. Thomas toured America four times, with his last public engagement taking place at the City College of New York. A few days later, he collapsed in the Chelsea Hotel after a long drinking bout at the White Horse Tavern. On November 9, 1953, he died at St. Vincent's Hospital in New York City at the age of 39. He had become a legendary figure, both for his work and the boisterousness of his life. He was buried in Laugharne, and almost 30 years later, a plaque to Dylan was unveiled in Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey.

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Dafydd Gam and Owain Glyyndwr

25th October
On 25th October 1415, Dafydd Gam was Killed on the field of The Battle of Agincourt, reportedly saving the life of King Henry V
Sir Dafydd ap Llewelyn ap Hywel (c. 1380 – October 25, 1415), better known as Dafydd Gam or Davy Gam, (The name "Gam" is a Welsh word meaining "crooked" or "bent", as it is recorded that Gam had a characteristic squint), was a member of one of the most prominent Welsh families in Breconshire, from Pen-pont on the river Usk, where his fa...mily's power base had developed from their consistent support for the marcher Lords of Brecon of the de Bohun family. So when Henry Bolingbroke (the future Henry IV) married the de Bohun hieress Mary and became Lord of Brecon, Dafydd Gam's family's allegiance transferred to him. Dafydd himself was in Henry's service, being paid the substantial annuity of 40 marks by Henry’s estate in 1399,

Dafydd Gam is regarded as a traitor by many Welsh people as he was a prominent opponent of Owain Glyndwr. When the Glyndwr rebellion broke out in 1400, Gam played a leading role in its opposition in the area and his lands in and around Brecon became a target for Glyndŵr's attacks. In 1404, according to legend Gam tried to assassinate Glyndŵr at his parliament at Machynlleth, but was released soon after the Parliament. If true this generous gesture would come back to haunt Glyndwr, as in 1905, Dafydd is named as a leader in the crushing defeat of Glyndŵr's men at the Battle of Pwll Melyn, near Usk, at which 300 of Glyndŵr's men were executed . His loyalty being rewarded with the gift of some of Glyndŵr's supporters' confiscated estates in Cardiganshire. In 1412 Gam was captured by Glyndŵr’s men and his ransom was paid directly and speedily from the King’s estates in Wales, indicating the esteem in which Gam was held by Henry. Glyndŵr had made Gam swear an oath to never bear arms against him again or oppose him in any other way, but on his release Gam immediately reneged on this oath, which resulted in Glyndŵr having Gam's Brecon estates attacked and burned in retaliation.
When Henry IV died in 1413, Henry V became ruler and Gam again was a loyal servent to the new king. Gam went with Henry V on campaign to France in 1415 and met his death on the field of Agincourt. Many reports of the battle suggest that in the late stages of the battle, with the result in the balance, Henry V was engaged in hand to hand fighting with the Duke of Alençon, who supposedly cut an ornament from Henry’s crown with a sword blow. Gam is said to have personally intervened to save Henry's life, only to have been struck a fatal blow in doing so and that as he lay dying on the field, he was knighted by King Henry.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dafydd_Gam

Thursday, October 23, 2014

Festiniog Railway

23rd October
On 23rd October 1863, Festiniog Railway introduced steam locomotives into general service, the first time this has been done anywhere in the world ...on a public narrow gauge railway.

The line was constructed between 1833 and 1836 to transport slate from the quarries around the inland town of Blaenau Ffestiniog to the coastal town of Porthmadog where it was loaded onto ships. The railway was graded so that loaded wagons could be run by gravity downhill all the way from Blaenau Ffestiniog to the port. The empty wagons were then hauled back up by horses.
During the late 1850s it became clear that the line was reaching its operational capacity, while the output of the Blaenau Ffestiniog slate quarries continued to rise. In 1860, the board of the company began to investigate the possibility of introducing steam locomotives to increase the carrying capacity of the railway. In 1862 the company advertised for manufacturers to tender to build the line's first locomotives. In February 1863, the bid of George England and Co. was accepted and production of the first locomotives was begun.
These steam locomotives allowed much longer slate trains to be run and this also enabled the official introduction of passenger trains in 1865: the Ffestiniog was the first narrow gauge railway in Britain to carry passengers.
Today, the Ffestiniog Railway is a major tourist attraction located mainly within the Snowdonia National Park, travelling through both forested and mountainous scenery.

Thursday, October 16, 2014

Goronwy ab Ednyfed (c. 1205 - 17 October 1268)

17th October
Goronwy ab Ednyfed (c. 1205 - 17 October 1268) was seneschal to Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, between 1246 and 1256.
As seneschal, he was in charge of domestic arrangements and the administration of servants and held his lands in Wales free from all dues and services other than military service in time of war.
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Goronwy's father was Ednyfed Fychan, senechal to Llywelyn the Great and later his son Dafydd ap Llywelyn and his mother, Gwenllian, was daughter of Rhys ap Gruffydd (Lord Rhys). Goronwy's brother Tudur, a leading adviser of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, succeeded him as seneschal to Llywelyn until his death in 1278. He was a direct ancestor of Henry Tudor (King Henry VII of England) and his great grandson also Goronwy was an uncle by marriage of Owain Glyndwr.

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Iolo Goch

Iolo Goch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Iolo Goch (c. 1320 – c. 1398), (meaning Iolo the Red in English), was a medieval Welsh poet or bard who composed poems addressed to Owain Glyndŵr, among others.

en.wikipedia.org

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Saunders Lewis

15th October
Born on this day 1893 in Wallasey, England (brought up by his Welsh family, amongst the Welsh community on Merseyside)
Saunders Lewis, poet, dramatist, historian, literary critic and political activist, who in 2005 was voted 10th in a BBC Wales poll to name Wales' greatest-ever person.
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Saunders Lewis’ legacy is immense, alongside his literary output - he wrote plays, poems and novels and was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature- he had a profound influence on 20th century Welsh politics. A founder of Plaid Cymru, he was also instrumental to the creation of Cymdeithas Yr Iaith Gymraeg (Welsh Language Society)
At the outbreak of World War I, Lewis was sudying at The University of Liverpool, he enlisted as an officer with the South Wales Borderes and it was this experience, especially fighting alongside Irishmen, seems to have had a significant effect on him. It helped to shape his convictions about the importance of Welsh national identity although - unlike hard line Irish republicans - he stopped short of advocating violence against representatives of the British state.
After the war, he returned to university to graduate in English, then in 1922, he was appointed as a lecturer in Welsh at the University College of Wales, Swansea. During his time at Swansea he produced some of his most exciting works of literary criticism; A School of Welsh Augustans (1924), Williams Pantycelyn (1927), and Braslun o hanes llenyddiaeth Gymraeg (An outline history of Welsh literature) (1932). In 1925 along with H.R. Jones and Lewis Valentine, he founded Plaid Genedlaethol Cymru (National Party of Wales) (which would become Plaid Cymru), with the principal aim of the party, being to foster a Welsh speaking Wales. In 1936 Lewis, together Jones and Valentine, set fire to the new RAF base at Penyberth in Gwynedd. They gave themselves up to the police, claiming justification on nationalist and pacifist grounds. In the aftermath of the Penyberth arson, Lewis lost his university lecturing post and in controversial circumstances went on trial at the Old Bailey in London. He was sentenced to nine months imprisonment.
In 1962 Lewis gave a lecture on BBC radio entitled Tynged Yr Iaith (The Fate of the Language). In this speech Lewis predicted the extinction of the Welsh language and declared that the language would die unless revolutionary methods were used to defend it. The broadcast led to the creation of Cymdeithas Yr Iaith Gymraeg (Welsh Language Society) and inspired its campaigns of direct action over the following decades. Cymdeithas protests undoubtedly played a part in the establishment of S4C, the Welsh language television channel, in 1982 and the Welsh Language Act of 1993.
Saunders Lewis died in September 1985 at the age of 91.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saunders_Lewis