Latest news with #DylanThomas
Yahoo
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'Raised in a council house, I never saw writing as a career'
Hanan Issa has just surpassed the halfway milestone in her five-year stint as National Poet for Wales. Growing up, she said she never saw writing as a viable career: "I'm working class, raised in a council house and to me, it wasn't considered an option." But as the 11-day Hay Festival draws to a close on Sunday, she has praised organisers for providing a space for people from marginalised backgrounds in what she said had traditionally been a "very white, middle class space". Hay Festival Global describes itself as "the antidote to polarisation", bringing together "diverse voices to listen, talk, debate and create", tackling some of the "biggest political, social and environmental challenges of our time". Unseen photos show iconic poet Dylan Thomas in fit of rage What does it mean to be Welsh? Palestinian writer's debut wins Dylan Thomas prize After graduating from Cardiff University, where she studied English literature, Hanan felt teaching was her only plausible career but knew it was not for her, having already had some experience in the field. "I was the first in my family to go to university and so I felt this pressure to have what's considered 'a proper job'," the 39-year-old said. Hanan went on to work in the voluntary sector, expecting a life-long career in social services. That was until 2016 when then-prime minister David Cameron said some Muslim women were not integrating into British society and were not learning English. "[He] spoke so ignorantly... I was like 'umm, hello! We're here you know'," Hanan said. This was the catalyst that turned Hanan's writing from personal to public, writing a spoken word piece that she posted online. Since then, poetry - which she did only for herself or as a gift for loved ones' birthdays and weddings - has become something she has shared publicly to connect with others. Hanan's first time at Hay Festival in the Powys town of Hay-on-Wye was seven years ago as a selected writer joining the Writers at Work programme, which aims to support emerging Welsh talent. She described the 10 days of workshops and events as an "eye-opener", helping to demystify the process of getting published and filling her with confidence as a writer too. "If it had just been a one-off, I would say that was a tokenistic opportunity. But it hasn't been. I've been asked back time and time again... as a performer onstage," she said. Some of Hanan's highlights of the festival this year included seeing Pulitzer Prize-winning data journalist Mona Chalabi in conversation, as well as Kehinde Andrews, the UK's first professor of black studies. Throughout her visit this year, the poet said she noticed "way more hijabis". "In a very sort of shallow aesthetic way, for me it's a natural thing to walk into a space and look around to see what the demographic is," she said. "It's not very often that I look around and see hijabis in literary spaces, put it that way, and it's been lovely." She said children were genuinely excited about writing a poem during one of her on-site events. "If kids are still excited about books, then there's hope," she said. "There's hope for that curiosity that we need to drive forward any kinds of progress and kindness in this world." For Jade Bradford, from Hertfordshire, it was a life-long dream to attend Hay Festival. As a communications and engagement manager for a social housing provider in south Wales, writing is Jade's second job. After growing up seeing the Guardian's Hay Festival supplement every year when her dad would buy the paper, this year she was in attendance as a Writer at Work. "Publishing, it can feel like a closed door sometimes and it's hard to know who you need to speak to, what it is you actually need, how you get an agent," the 39-year-old said. She said if audiences at events like Hay Festival were not representative they may not know their books are not diverse enough, or "that they need to hear other voices". Jade added the festival's efforts in engaging with TikTokers bringing in a younger audience and providing a space for all voices was "really making the difference". "I'm seeing younger people, more ethnically diverse people, a lot of really good queer representation happening... and that's really, really important," she said. "We're seeing a more modern Wales perhaps being represented whilst not losing that classic literary approach. "We have a really rich national history of literature and there's nothing wrong with being middle-class, there's nothing wrong with really literary writing like classic books. "There's just a place for all of our different types of writing. That's the most important thing." A highlight of Jade's week at Hay was going to see curator, writer and broadcaster Ekow Eshun "on a panel of black voices talking about black history", while another standout was attending a talk with the writer of the film Mr Burton. She said if someone were to tell her childhood self that she could go somewhere and meet writers, breathe the same air as Jacqueline Wilson and then in the future become a writer herself, "her head would explode". This year was also Rhys Thomas' first time at Hay Festival. He had a "full circle" moment watching poet John Cooper Clarke take to the stage, after first seeing him while working at his local festival aged 16. "I just didn't realise that poetry and literature could have that raw edge to it," he said. "He was funny, he was swearing. He's a rock and roll star who uses poems instead of guitar solos." Rhys, a journalist from Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, said it was not until he moved to England for university that he started immersing himself in books and writing. The 28-year-old described the literary world as "very elite", and said it could "feel alienating and inaccessible". "I didn't have any books in the house growing up. So I was both sort of economically and culturally not really someone you'd associate with the art world," he said. "Over time it has given me a lot of self doubt and confidence issues, especially around like, can I function in the world as a writer? But also in a bigger existential way of, this is a clash against the person I'm supposed to be." Rhys has been writing for a year and a half, and before applying for the competitive Writer at Work programme said he "didn't believe in himself". He said the scheme was "pretty full-on", with eight hours of activities a day helping to develop writing skills and tailored to all 10 emerging writers on the cohort. Rhys, who has already filled his 125-page A6 notepad up during the scheme, said he was one of the lucky ones getting to "spend 10 days or so really feeling like we can be in this world, without it breaking our bank accounts". "Even at a practical level, it's given me hope for when I'm scribbling away at the dead of night, it's not a pointless endeavour," he added. Hanan said she has now reached a point in her life "when you feel a space is not inclusive or open to you, you be the one to open that door and wedge a doorstop underneath". "If you can, then do it because you opening that door, wedging in that door stop, means that other people can walk through after you," she added.
Powys County Times
3 days ago
- Automotive
- Powys County Times
Vintage and classic lorries visit Llandeilo on annual run
A parade of vintage and classic lorries visited Llandeilo recently as part of an annual tradition. On Sunday, May 18, Station Road was filled with historical vehicles for the start of the annual lorry run. The event attracted lorries from across the country, including regions such as South and Mid Wales, Cheshire, Shropshire, and Herefordshire. The variety of vehicles ranged from small Bedfords and Albions dating back to the 1940s and 1950s to more modern tractor units from the 1980s and 1990s. There were flatbeds, stock boxes, tippers, and tractor units on display. Among the participants was Tommy Williams, from the well-known haulage company TD Williams Ltd, who showcased four of his fleet of Bedford lorries from the 1940s. The company, now in its 100th year, began as coal merchants before expanding into general haulage and distribution. The convoy departed from Station Road, navigated through the narrow main street of Llandeilo, then crossed the River Towy to Ffairfach. The journey continued onto the B4300, taking the south side of the Towy to Carmarthen, and passing through Llanarthney, Capel Dewi, and Llangunnor. Upon reaching Carmarthen, the convoy manoeuvred through roundabouts to join the A40 to St Clears, before taking the slip road towards Pendine. The procession passed through the bustling Laugharne, famous for its association with Dylan Thomas, who lived there from 1949 until his death in 1953. The town also inspired the fictional town of Llareggub in Under Milk Wood. The convoy continued on the A4066 to Llanmiloe and Pendine, where the lorries parked on the beach, famous for land speed record attempts. After lunch, the procession retraced its route back to Laugharne, passing the well-known Browns Hotel, before heading back to St Clears. The convoy then took the Red Roses road to Kilgetty and Narberth, before joining the A40 again for the return journey to Carmarthen and finally finishing in Llandeilo.
BBC News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Dylan Thomas: Unseen photos show the poet in a fit of rage
Dylan Thomas implored his readers to "rage, rage against the dying of the light". And newly uncovered photos, lost in a drawer for decades, show the Welsh poet heeding his own words as he wrecked an employer's office after finding out they had no pay for him. Thomas had a job making wartime documentaries for Strand Film Company in London in 1942 when a photographer captured him waiting to collect a cheque. When no money was forthcoming, he can then be seen breaking up the furniture like a spoiled rock star in the series of never-before published photos. A quick-thinking Strand receptionist told the photographer to document Thomas's outburst then tucked the evidence away, said Jeff Towns, a Dylan Thomas expert and author. He bought the photos and got the back story from the receptionist's daughter, telling Cerys Matthews on BBC Radio 6 Music he believed Thomas's violent tantrum was the result of him being desperate for money. "There's one picture of him looking immaculate [with a] big smile," he said. "No cheque and he's pulling the desk apart like a rock and roller throwing a TV out the window."The photos and story appear in Towns' new book, the Wilder Shores of Dylan Thomas. "I got this letter out the blue from a woman who said her mother had worked at Strand Films are straight away I knew how important it was," he said, explaining how it was the only time Thomas had "a proper job with a salary".Thomas definitely worked at Strand he said, because one of his friends, Julian MacLaren-Ross, wrote about it a book. "He writes about what they got up to at the [Strand] office, so everything rang true," he said. "Plus I know that [Thomas] was forever living from hand to mouth," he said of the Swansea-born writer, who had a wife and two children to support at the time. "So the guy was desperate for money and obviously when he went in he thought he was going to trouser a few quid to get through the next few days. "Even just to get to the pub that night. "When it wasn't there, he flipped." Originally from east London, Towns has been antiquarian book dealer for more than 50 years and currently runs Dylans Bookstore in has written several books about the Welsh bard and holds an important collection of his letters, photos and memorabilia. The outburst in Strand Films was unusual, he argued."He got into trouble when he was drunk, but he was a pacifist in his own way." Towns said Thomas, who was only 5ft 6in (1.68m), always said he was above average height "for Wales". "He knew he was small, but if a big soldier came in and started being jingoistic he would challenge them and get thrown out on his backside," he said. "He didn't fly off the handle a lot - there are a couple of times when things went a bit wrong - but by and large he was passive and talked his way out of problems." The poet's fans were his worst enemies in some ways, he said. "In America his favourite whisky was a bourbon called Old Grandad. "People would turn up at his hotel room with a bottle and want him to drink it in front of them."When people were feeding him lots of whisky he could get irascible."I think he liked to be the centre of attention, in a pub he would tell great stories and people would buy him drinks, but I don't think he was known for a temper in any way. "[His wife] Caitlin had the temper and she would give him a right hiding."
Irish Examiner
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Examiner
Colin Sheridan: Paradise lost? Today's teens miss out on beauty of yesterday's poetry
Good weather can only mean one thing: Leaving Cert English paper one. Soundings. The Planter's Daughter versus Paradise Lost. Emily Dickinson vibing on a funeral in her brain. Dylan Thomas's point-blank refusal to mourn. Paddy Kavanagh counting the bicycles headed down to Billy Brennan's yard, hornier than a goat, thirsty at the prospect of chasing a bit of skirt down Iniskeen Road on a July evening. Feeling nostalgic, I reached for a copy of the great green book and started to leaf through its fabled pages. First published in 1969, Soundings — more cultural touchstone than simple poetry anthology — had more reprints than the King James Bible. There isn't a house in Ireland built in the last 55 years that hasn't had a half dozen copies cycle through it. Notes, scribbled in pencil, about the margins. Arrows and underlines elucidating on curious metaphors. A girl's name. A heart with an arrow through it. The lovestruck doodles were poems all by themselves. An introduction from editor and academic Augustine Martin implored students to ignore the glossaries provided in the footnotes. 'Nobody — teacher, classmate, critic or parent — can read a poem for you,' Augustine warned. 'Ultimately, the reader himself must lay hold to the poem and experience it in the intimacy of his own mind. Unless he does this, the whole effort of teaching is at worst a fraud, at best a waste of time.' The front cover of the much-loved Soundings poetry book, which was part of the Leaving Cert English curriculum for many years. Strong words, and ones that my own English teacher taught by. To dare read the footnotes was a cowardly surrender to conformity. He would rather you die thinking Austin Clarke had genuinely lost a heifer if it meant you read the poem your way — even if you misunderstood it — so long as you didn't go straight to the bottom to see what the cheat-sheet said. Sadly, Soundings was dumped off the Leaving Cert English curriculum in 2000 after a significant revision of the English syllabus. This new module introduced a broader and more diverse range of texts, including contemporary authors, modern novels, and film studies. The aim was to modernise the curriculum and move beyond the traditional, predominantly male and canonical selections that characterised Soundings. While the reasoning was sound, one can't help wondering what students today and for the last 25 years have lost by being deprived of the exposure to some of the greatest minds in literature. When you're young and live in your own head, reading Percy Bysshe Shelley's Stanzas written in Dejection near Naples can be quite formative. Especially if you had a teacher who brought it to life, as I had. What happened? Was Paradise Lost too dark, too apocalyptic, too critical of Man's first disobedience, to be trusted in the hands of an 18-year-old? Has the Department of Education ever watched an episode of Euphoria? Perhaps the straw that broke the lost heifer's back was The Planter's Daughter, Austin Clarke's love letter to a beauty so profound, it silenced entire pubs. Nowadays, a line of pure genius such as 'They say that her beauty/Was music in mouth' could be construed as a sentiment a little too close to outright objectification, and therefore be disqualified as leery misogynistic nonsense. If that's the calculation, then, oh, what a loss. Some German students visited our school during my secondary school years. I slow-danced with a young fraulein from Baden-Württemberg to The Pretenders I'll Stand by You at a disco in the town hall, and weeks later, in an effort to keep the romance alive until I was old enough to run away to the Black Forest to lumberjack, I wrote her a letter in which I may have told her that she was 'the Sunday in every week'. The scribbles in the margins were commonplace. In my defence, it was the pre-internet age, and we had bonded over our mutual love of poetry and Dawson's Creek. You miss all the shots you don't take. Weeks passed before a letter arrived with a German stamp on it. 'Why Sunday?' the fraulein asked, obviously unimpressed. 'It's the worst day of the week. It is long and boring, and I get depressed because I have to go back to school on Monday.' Bloody Germans, one might say, but here was a valuable lesson in her cold-eyed critique. 'No poem means quite the same thing to any two readers,' Augustine Martin said, 'or even the same reader at different periods of his life.' The fraulein read it her way, and I read it mine. Nostalgia is a seductive sauce, but I can't help thinking Soundings was something worth keeping in the schoolbags of our kids. How else will teenagers come to know that "beauty is truth, truth beauty'? And "that is all we know on earth, and all we need to know". So too, that "the mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven'. When you're young, there's surely no more relatable a sentiment than that.
The Guardian
24-05-2025
- The Guardian
‘A gardener's dream itinerary': a tour of Carmarthenshire, the Garden of Wales
Driving the back roads of Carmarthenshire in spring, beneath broad oaks, over little stone bridges and along stretches of fertile woodland, windswept peatland and flowery meadows, I was reminded of the rudimentary treasure maps I loved drawing as a child. The ones composed of contrasting, caricatured environments spaced neatly within the concise contours of a fictional island, say, bearing labels like Wild Wood, Barren Bog and Misty Hills. Enticing though these untamed landscapes are, I'm in search of a different kind of bounty. Beyond its green, green hills, castles, beaches and historic market towns (not least Dylan Thomas's Laugharne), Carmarthenshire is also considered the Garden of Wales – which was news to me, despite family ties to the area. I've visited some of these botanical highlights over the years, such as Aberglasney Gardens for their tonal variety and the National Botanic Garden with its astounding glasshouse. But with ever more tempting places to eat, sleep and ramble within this corner of Wales, I've often thought of composing a gardener's dream itinerary: a handful of the county's best gardens, a forest walk, an inviting pub or two, and somewhere lovely to stay the night. This spring I finally got around to road testing it. The first thing to figure out was the all-important base from which to explore the county. Equidistant between the towns of Carmarthen and Llandeilo, forming the apex of a Carmarthenshire triangle, is the pretty village of Brechfa: a clutch of stone cottages, a community shop, pub and chapel below a forested hillside and beside the frothing River Cothi. It's also the home of Tŷ Mawr, a Grade II-listed country hotel and restaurant that prides itself on its dining, spacious rooms (Tŷ Mawr means big house), dog-friendliness and a location at once 'in the middle of nowhere yet close to everywhere'– which was certainly true for the purposes of my visit, with all waypoints little more than 20 minutes' drive away. Welcoming my wife and I at the end of our M4 slog from Hampshire was hotelier David, who with his partner, Gill, took the reins of Tŷ Mawr in 2022. After breakfast, there was a temptation to savour the hotel's own apple-blossomed garden and terrace, but our first location beckoned: Abergwili's Bishop's Park and Gardens. Now managed by the Tywi Gateway Trust, charitable investment has helped to rejuvenate this relic site on the outskirts of Carmarthen (also the home of the Carmarthenshire Museum), while the restored grounds encompass a planted woodland walk, a water meadow and lake, and specimen trees once the pride of the resident bishops, including monkey puzzles and dawn redwoods. At its heart is the Jenkinson Garden: a series of intensively gardened 19th century-themed beds, which head gardener Blue Barnes-Thomas infuses with vibrant plug-ins – tulips and crocuses for spring, umbels and sweet peas for summer. Walking me around the site, he explained the next steps in the renewal project, including renovating its 18th-century walled garden with new pathways, accessible greenhouses and heritage gooseberries. Lunch was at Wright's in Llanarthney. Owned and run by food writer Simon Wright, together with his wife, Maryann, it offers a chic, pared-down menu of elaborate flavours, and a lovely asparagus salad. If you sampled a glass too many of the robust house wine, the good news is that Aberglasney Gardens is only a stone's throw across the Tywi valley, its floral exuberance and plant diversity a kind of intoxication in itself. Much like Bishop's Park, Aberglasney is a story of successful regeneration: a crumbling mansion and a four-hectare (10-acre) garden painstakingly and beautifully resuscitated, opening to the public in 1999. Featuring alpine, kitchen and Elizabethan cloister gardens, meadows crammed with fritillaria and camassia, an indoor ninfarium and a walled garden reimagined by garden designer Penelope Hobhouse, the place is a genuine wonder. In 2011, Kew-trained head gardener Joseph Atkin was appointed to continue the garden's evolution, which saw Aberglasney develop into one of the finest formal gardens in the UK. A few years ago, Atkin hung up the trowel and opened a pub – The Plough – up the road in Felingwm, where you can find relaxed, wood-fired dining, Welsh ales and – if you're cheeky enough to ask – a little gardening advice on the side. On into the afternoon sun, which only intensified the lush profusion, and 'up country' to Llandysul, as no garden itinerary is complete without an independent plant nursery – and here lies one of the greats. Spanning 1.2 hectares of polytunnels, open stock yards and shopfront, Farmyard Nurseries is known for its eclectic, hardy plants, including an expansive collection of exquisite hellebores. Sign up to The Traveller Get travel inspiration, featured trips and local tips for your next break, as well as the latest deals from Guardian Holidays after newsletter promotion But its best-kept secret is the woodland garden at the back. This is where nursery owner Richard Bramley and his team have let fancies run feral. Japanese maples and bright rhododendrons spill over narrow woodchip pathways, while drifts of spring ephemerals and shade-loving perennials (such as yellow comfrey and, indeed, many of the nursery's hellebores) spread out below the deciduous canopy. Buried within are further surprises: a wildlife pond and a Tolkienesque lath and plaster hut – a whimsical, after-hours project Richard told me was contrived as they went along. We left Farmyard Nurseries with a crate of the liquorice-scented agastache 'Blackadder' and a scarlet aquilegia I've long sought. If floral yearnings aren't satiated at this point in the day, on the way back to Brechfa, you could drop into Norwood Gardens and Tea Rooms, which offers a range of Mediterranean, woodland and bog plantings. But we were keen to get back in time for the three-course dinner at Tŷ Mawr, featuring butter bean cassoulet and braised hake. Our meal plans were almost scuppered, however, when our car broke down on the Llandysul to Brechfa road, high on the lofty peat moor above Tŷ Mawr. The dramatic remoteness of the location was actually quite comical – we couldn't have picked a more isolated spot for an alternator failure (here's a tip: if it sounds like something just fell out of your engine, reconsider crossing barren moorland). Owing to the kindness of a local mechanic, we were back at the hotel within an hour or so, leaning into a mushroom paté starter. A slower pace on day two allowed for a wander along one of Brechfa's many surrounding forestry trails, managed by Natural Resources Wales (NRW). We opted for the Keepers Riverside Trail, its abundance of pale pink cuckoo flowers leading down a misty, gorse-lit track into shafts of morning sunlight. There are numerous mountain bike and riding trails here also, though NRW are still working to reopen the Brechfa Forest Garden – an experimental forestry plot established in the late 1950s that now makes for an impressive coniferous arboretum – after storm damage. You can then take the road south, crossing the River Tywi once more, for the National Botanic Garden of Wales. Resist making straight for the Great Glasshouse perched at the top of the hill – the largest single-span glasshouse in the world. Instead, let that be the encore and take your time meandering up – via the daylily-lined lake and the deep herbaceous beds; the Japanese, walled, kitchen and boulder gardens; and the orchid-filled tropical house. And once in the vast glasshouse, enjoy the snaking pathways that lead through geographically themed zones displaying the likes of Australian banksia, South African protea and magnificent Macaronesian echium. The garden's progressive aspirations include reversing the decline of Welsh-native flora and getting every school child in Wales engaged with nature. A new cycle path, already partially opened, is due to be completed this autumn, connecting most of the locations mentioned here. Beginning at Bishop's Park and tracing a former railway track through the scenic Tywi valley, you can jump off for the botanic gardens, Wright's and Aberglasney, and do away with the car altogether. The trip was provided by Discover Carmarthenshire and Tŷ Mawr Hotel and Restaurant (doubles from £140 B&B). Lunch was hosted at Wright's
