This week’s Top Ten Tuesday prompt is technically about books with nationalities in the title, but I didn’t have enough on my shelves and prefer to stick to books I know… so instead, you get ten Welsh books and books about Wales!
- Afonydd, ed. Sian Northey and Ness Owen.
This is a bilingual poetry collection in which poets contributed a poem in English or Welsh, and the editors arranged translation into the other language. I found it a lovely experience, a respectful one that acknowledges that many Welsh people only speak English thanks to centuries of suppression by the English. The editors also have another collection, A450, which is similarly put together but not a favourite for me. Something about Afonydd resonated just a bit more. - Howl’s Moving Castle, by Diana Wynne Jones.
Didn’t expect that, did you? But if you’ve read the book (rather than watching the Studio Ghibli adaptation), you’ll know that Howl (Howell) is Welsh, and his Welshness is played on multiple times in the story, from his rugby jersey to the “nonsense” song sung by Calcifer (which is of course “Sospan fach“). I love highlighting the Welshness of this book to people who somehow missed it (it isn’t subtle) or only saw the Studio Ghibli version. - Welsh Food Stories, by Carwyn Graves.
I didn’t know much about typically Welsh food other than the best-known standbys: Welsh rarebit, bara brith, Welshcakes, cawl. I enjoyed this book, and laughed a bit at how stereotypically Welsh some of my tastes (like my love of cheese and of sweet, fruity cider) apparently are. - Vanished Wales, by Carwyn Jones.
Has some unexpected gaps, making no mention whatsoever of Capel Celyn (a Welsh village which was forcibly cleared of people to create a reservoir to serve a city in England)… but nonetheless, a fascinating survey of places in Wales that are now gone, some of which I knew about even though I was born after their destruction, because they remain that present to people. - Castles of the Welsh Princes, by Paul R. Davis.
If you have a fascination with castles, welp, look no further! Note that this one does not discuss the Norman castles built in Wales, so some of the best known Welsh castles aren’t here. - The Grey King, by Susan Cooper.
As a teen, the fact that this book is set in Wales and heavily influenced by the Welsh landscape and Welsh mythology meant a lot. And it’s a lovely story, though I don’t suggest reading it in isolation — start with Over Sea, Under Stone, or if that doesn’t quite work for you to hook you into the world (it’s aimed at a younger audience), skip to The Dark is Rising and then go back to Over Sea, Under Stone if you’re interested in reading more (just read it before Greenwitch). - The Owl Service, by Alan Garner.
This is a retelling of the story of Blodeuwedd that scared the pants off me as a kid. It is genuinely creepy and powerful, and remains really good. - Country Dance, by Margiad Evans.
I read a lot of Welsh fiction in English when I was at university, both because I studied the topic and because the university library had it in copious amounts, but it’s been a long time and many of them are blurry in my mind, so I’ll choose just a couple of books to stand in for all of them — this one because it was the first book I’d read by a Welsh writer while intending to do so. The introduction (by Caitrin Collier) mentioned the way Welsh literature wasn’t valued, the fact that writers like Margiad Evans are barely mentioned outside Wales (and for her, weren’t even mentioned in Wales when she was looking for Welsh writing)… and yep, I’m familiar. - Feet in Chains, by Kate Roberts.
The current translation available is by Katie Gramich, who taught the module on Welsh fiction in English that I took. I don’t think I’ve actually read this translation, but I loved the class, and this book was a revelation. The fact that Welsh soldiers’ families were notified of their deaths in English, a language that none of them spoke and which no one around them spoke, is a fact that clings to my mind ever since. - Postcolonialism Revisited, by Kirsti Bohata.
The book which made me understand that Wales, too, was colonised — and the effects of that on my own life. It is a somewhat technical read, but one which I wish a few more people would attend to, because the utter incomprehension of the effects of colonisation on Wales and the Welsh language online is a regular irritant.
I’ve run out of space to add more, like Glyn Jones’ The Dragon Has Two Tongues, which contains a quotation I’ve said many times: “To me, anyone can be a Welshman who chooses to be so and is prepared to take the consequences.”
But you get the drift!
