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National Eisteddfod 2025: Dramatist and Science and Technology Medal winners announced

The winners of the Dramatist and Science and Technology have been announced at the National Eisteddfod 2025, which is being held in Wrexham. Greta Siôn from Gwaelod-y-garth, Cardiff, is the winner of the main drama prize at this year's Wrecsam National Eisteddfod. Her name was announced during a special ceremony on the Pavilion stage today (7 August). The Dramatists' Medal supports playwrights writing in Welsh by offering a unique opportunity to develop their work, along with broader experiences provided by a consortium of some of the leading theatre and production companies working in Welsh here in Wales. This year, the 2025 Dramatists' Medal is awarded for composing a new stage play, or a proposal for a new stage play on any theme for a cast of no more than five performers. Playwrights were invited to submit either a sketch including a story outline, setting and time, character profiles etc., along with three dialogued scenes… or a full draft of a play lasting 30–45 minutes. The Medal is donated in memory of Eiryth and Urien Wiliam, by their children Hywel, Sioned and Steffan Wiliam. This year's financial prize of £3,000is awarded by the Eisteddfod. Members of the consortium include Frân Wen, Theatr Clwyd, Theatr Cymru, Sherman Theatre, Torch Theatre, Arad Goch Theatre Company, and Theatr Bara Caws. Representatives from these companies were among the judging panel, and two freelance artists, Mel Owen and Mared Jarman, also sat on the panel to ensure diverse and representative voices were an integral part of the process. Delivering the adjudication, Steffan Donnelly said, 'As a panel, we thoroughly enjoyed scrutinising, discussing and debating the 20 submissions received – seeking out playwrights who created striking, exciting work that challenged the panel's imagination and thinking. "Everyone on stage today felt that new writing is alive and well in Wales," Daniel Lloyd added: "Presennol by Caer Enlli is a conventional monologue confident in its form, feels complete as a drama, and succeeds in captivating... "It's a very readable play, with every beat clear, the characterisation precise, and the story flowing. The playwright understands the importance of balancing light and shade. The structure is solid, with a clear focus and crisis points. "It's great to see the main character go on such a complete journey – Ieuan at the start of the play is different from the Ieuan at the end. "Through empathy, he discovers who he can be, acts differently, and a new life path begins to blossom before him. Indeed, the paths of the two main characters cross and intertwine in powerful and emotional ways. "This is a drama rooted in a complex and understandable context. And so, for these reasons, it is a pleasure to award the 2025 Dramatists' Medal to Presennol by Caer Enlli." Greta Siôn was a pupil at Ysgol Gyfun Gymraeg Plasmawr before going on to study English Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Liverpool. While there, she was president of the drama society and took part in several productions, including a sketch comedy troupe that performed annually at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. After graduating, Greta worked as a runner on the drama series Rownd a Rownd for two years, where she had the opportunity to write the digital series Copsan as part of a mentoring scheme. In 2024, Greta received a Master's degree in Creative Writing from Oxford University, and she now writes for the soap operas Pobol y Cwm and Rownd a Rownd as a freelance writer. She greatly values both productions for their ongoing support and the privilege of collaborating with experienced writers and editorial teams who have taught her so much. Greta is also grateful to her entire family for their unwavering support – even when she says silly things like wanting to write for a living! They have nurtured her passion and enthusiasm for the world of drama unfailingly – including her grandparents, who often took her to see plays at Theatr Clwyd when she stayed with them in Ruthin. Presennol is the first full-length stage play she has written. The newly restructured competition reflects the processes of the professional theatre sector and offers a prize that develops drama in the usual way while supporting a playwright's career in the industry. The financial prize has increased to £3,000 and in addition to the monetary award, a sum has been set aside by the consortium and the Eisteddfod to develop the winning work, including a full script reading at next year's Eisteddfod. The Science and Technology Medal at the National Eisteddfod in Wrecsam has been presented to Dewi Bryn Jones, a leading pioneer in Welsh language and speech technologies Over recent years, Dewi has done more than anyone else to develop Welsh computational language tools and resources, enabling the public to use Welsh on their computers and in digital communication. His technologies also support disabled individuals and those with additional needs to communicate in Welsh. Dewi leads a team of software developers at the Language Technologies Unit at Canolfan Bedwyr, Bangor University. His vision and contributions have driven innovation in Welsh writing technology, Welsh speech technology, and Welsh machine translation in the digital world. The medal, first awarded in 2004, recognises and celebrates an individual's contribution to science and technology through the medium of Welsh. Fittingly, the first recipient was Professor Glyn O Phillips, a prominent scientist from Wrecsam and the founding head of the North East Wales Institute – now Wrexham University. The aim of the medal is to honour and celebrate outstanding contributions to the science and technology industry through Welsh. Professor Delyth Prys, former head of the technology unit at Canolfan Bedwyr, said: "The award is thoroughly deserved by Dewi. I would go so far as to say that without his contribution, we wouldn't have any Welsh software today." Professor Deri Tomos, a previous recipient of the Science and Technology Medal, added: 'This unit is absolutely vital to the future of the language. Dewi lives and breathes the world of computing – it's a core part of his life, and I'm sure he's delighted to receive this honour." Dewi Bryn Jones, was raised in Pwllheli and graduated in Computer Science from the University of York. He worked in Cambridge, Zurich, and later joined Nokia in Finland. While in Helsinki, he began translating and localising Netscape Navigator, an early web browser before the days of Google and others. He returned to Wales to work with Draig Technology Ltd, contributing to the development of To Bach, a program that helps add accents to Welsh words while typing, which has now been downloaded over 100,000 times. In 2002, Dewi joined the Language Technologies Unit at Canolfan Bedwyr, where he continues to lead a team of software developers and collaborate with terminologists and linguists. He is now researching new developments in Artificial Intelligence technologies, which are revolutionising the field but pose challenges for minority languages like Welsh. Dewi said: 'It's a great pleasure and honour to do this work and to be part of a team of others who are just as enthusiastic and talented – more talented than me. It's a unit of software developers and language experts with a mix of skills to create all this work. We're creating apps that work in Welsh and showing that it's possible to build resources that expand the use of Welsh and normalise the language in the tech world." Since joining Canolfan Bedwyr, Dewi has completely rewritten the code for Cysill, the Welsh spelling and grammar checker, to make it compatible with modern computers and networks. He led the development of Cysgliad, which includes Cysill and the electronic dictionary suite Cysgeir, first published in 2004 and still maintained and developed today. He has also developed many of the databases and computing platforms that support general and terminological Welsh dictionaries, including the digital version of Geiriadur yr Academi, and is responsible for developing and maintaining Y Porth Termau Cenedlaethol. Over twenty years ago, Dewi began researching speech technology for Welsh, collaborating with researchers in Ireland working on similar technology for Irish Gaelic. He has developed synthetic Welsh voices that give speech to people who cannot speak due to medical reasons, as well as voices for games and other digital products. In 2017, he developed Lleisiwr, which enables NHS Wales patients to create synthetic Welsh versions of their own voice before losing the ability to speak, with an innovative bilingual version following in 2020. He is currently working with the NHS and a Scottish company to create a variety of bilingual synthetic voices with different accents for children and young people in Wales. Many of these technologies have been combined in Macsen, the first Welsh-language personal assistant, which can be controlled using Welsh voice commands and includes a range of Welsh-language skills such as weather updates, news, music, Wikipedia searches, translation, and more. Dewi has also played a key role in including Welsh in Mozilla's international Common Voice project, which allows volunteers to contribute their voices to an open database of recordings that supports the development of speech technology in many languages. He was central to the successful efforts to establish a Master's degree in Language Technologies at Bangor University, where he now lectures. He also supervised the first PhD in Speech Technology through the medium of Welsh and was the main author of the Language Technologies Handbook – the first of its kind written in Welsh on language and speech technologies. In other news, the National Eisteddfod yesterday announced that Niclas Parry is the new President of the Court and Chair of the Management Board. This was confirmed at today's Court meeting (7 August) following an open recruitment process. He succeeds Ashok Ahir, who was appointed in 2019. Mr Parry was a solicitor in Mold before being appointed as a judge in the Crown Courts in North Wales. He is also well known as a football commentator and recently accompanied the Wales women's team to the European Championship in Switzerland. Upon taking up the role, he stated that he would fight against any suggestion of relaxing the Welsh language rule and is committed to working in a practical way that includes Eisteddfod participants. Mr Parry also promised to ensure transparency in the decisions of the Court and the Management Board. 'I have no doubt at all that we must remain faithful to the Welsh language rule. It is entirely possible to live for a week using Welsh without missing out at all, as the provision for non- Welsh speakers is better than ever,' he said. And when the curtain falls on the National Eisteddfod on Saturday, the work of three key volunteers will come to an end. For 18 years, Cledwyn Ashford from Cefn-y-Bedd near Wrexham has led the Chief Steward Team, but last year he announced his intention to hang up the blue tabard for good. His friends Iolo Povey from Dyffryn Nantlle and Dylan Jones from Mold will also be stepping down from volunteering at the Eisteddfod. Between them, they have given 56 years of service to the National Eisteddfod. Volunteers are the backbone of the National Eisteddfod every year, and without them, it would be difficult to run the festival. From the dozens of Wrexham area residents who have tirelessly raised funds to the hundreds who are willing to share their time during the Eisteddfod, their contribution is essential.