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REVIEWS
"If you thought you knew Wrexham, this book will make you think again. A proud boast on the back of a new book and one which didn't fail to deliver as I read from cover to cover the fascinating Real Wrexham whilst stuck on a go-slow train running late to Cardiff yesterday. "Poet,
author and colleague Grahame Davies really gets under the skin of this
place we call home combining his knowledge as a local boy, his skill as
a journalist to separate fact from fiction, and taking a tour of the district
with people who know the area best - the locals." "What I most enjoy about the franchise - apart from the detective-like uncovering of obscure local facts - is the notion that such workaday spots as Wrexham, Newport etc are as worthy of investigation as say, Venice. And why the hell not? How often in travel literature do we have to put up with some white-suited snob purple-prosing their way around some famous historical ruin or other? "...Real Wrexham - that Welsh Cinderella of a town. Streets and suburbs are tramped; buildings explored; the dead conjured back into life. There's Wrexham lager and Elihu Yale; a werewolf and St Giles' Church; Richard Nixon and CS Lewis; Hightown "skyscrapers" and the Blue Lagoon. "But ultimately it is not the constant revelation of interesting factual tidbits that makes this book so enjoyable. Rather it is Davies' subjective engagement with the town. That unique personal response to place that we each experience - there are, after all, as many real Wrexhams out there as there are inhabitants of the town. "Fortunately
for us local-boy Davies is able to articulate his version of Wrexham with
all the honesty and enthusiasm of the discerning insider. And this is
what makes reading Real Wrexham - and the Real series in general - so
much more satisfying than flicking through some dry and dispassionate
guidebook." "Wrexham is another border town - this time in Wales - and Grahame Davies takes up this theme in his introduction to his book about the town called REAL WREXHAM:
"Sometimes
I read something and it seems to be so 'right' it is beautiful - and that
is how this short passage seems to me. It is something that often struck
me living where I do how exactly does one country (England) turn into
another (Wales) - and this describes it exactly. Grahame Davies is an
accomplished poet, journalist and critic and is also fascinated by his
home town - and it shows. This book; which seems to be part history, part
travelogue and part memoir, seems to be the ideal merging of his talents." "It
has been claimed that if Dublin happened to be eliminated by war or natural
disaster it would be possible to reconstruct the city through a careful
reading of James Joyce's Ulyssees. In similar circumstances Grahame Davies's
fascinating book would probably assist in the reconstruction of Wrexham." "This is a well-informed survey of the delights of a town known intimately by its author. I am sorry to say I have been to Wrexham only on one occasion: this is my loss, if the loving portrait drawn here is anything to go by. But there, Grahame Davies has a lively mind and a fine turn of phrase, which he puts to good purpose here." Meic Stephens, Cambria, February-March 2008, 51. "It's a very readable book, full of interesting information. Over the years, I have lent many books to Welsh and Welsh-language readers, but you won't be able to borrow this one! You will have to buy it yourself, and for £9.99 it's worth the price." A.D. 'Wrecsam yn Wir!' review in Y Clawdd, February 2008, 14. "Real Wrexham" is an unexpected gem of a book by Coedpoeth writer Grahame Davies ... In under 200 pages he teases out the unique character and heritage that make up our town - 'a place where landscapes, economies and cultures converge. A place of encounter and transition. A place where one and one makes three.' It's very much a personal history of Wrexham, the town and its environs, with enough quirky facts, myth busting and anecdotes to keep the pages turning." Real Wrexham by Grahame Davies ' Plaid Wrecsam blog. 27/12/08 'It is real, too, because Grahame Davies is an insider and every sentence is infused with personal, subjective experience. He is a poet, and his use of language is witty and unpredictable. The former malthouses of Island Green Brewery he describes as "like an upturned brassière in scalloped slate". His description of Minera Mountain, one suspects, would not be displayed in the tourist information centre: "common- land grazing for sheep, a foot- path for walkers, a scenic drive for tourists, a place to pick whinberries, a vantage point for radio hams, and a place to dump and torch stolen cars".' Nick Roe, About Wales, April 2008, p26.
"As a novel of
ideas Everything Must Change is a great intellectual achievement
and a fascinating state of the nation novel." "First published in Welsh as Rhaid i Bopeth Newid, the spark that ignited Grahame Davies's determination to extend as well as translate his novel into English caught fire through a study of the French philosopher Simone Weil who served on the republican side in the Spanish Civil War and who was affected by unexplained mystical experiences. "Weil died, aged
34, in 1943. Her activities, and those of Meinwen, a Welsh radical of
late 20th Century vintage, cross-cut through this closely-packed narrative" "The lasting
impression, refreshingly in literature from Wales (in English or Welsh)
is that the novel forces the reader to look at the country in a larger
European context. In addition, Grahame Davies makes his reader think,without
the novel being overly academic or philosophical. The experience is of
reading a poet's novel. Chapters unravel as tidily as stanzas. It is a
beautiful and assured read" "The skin of the Welsh language debate is often too thick and politically weighted to permeate, yet Davies offers a porous insight with Everything Must Change." Buzz magazine, August 2007. "Davies is tackling a difficult subject here. He aligns the fascist rise in inter-war Europe and the life of the Jewish French philosopher Simone Weil with the linguistic, political and cultural machinations of 21st Century Wales. "The result is
a deep and roaring work which tells Wales just how things really are.
A hard read? Actually much easier than it sounds. Its significance is
its origin. Davies is one of the few Welsh writers willing to risk reputation
by crossing the linguistic divide." "The present
climate of political change in Wales - whatever the outcome may be when
this review reaches print - strikes a particular resonance in Grahame
Davies's first novel in English. "His deep and sympathetic knowledge of Weil and her writing, drawn from his doctoral thesis, is counterpointed by his awareness of the issues that face Wales, and particularly the Welsh language, today. "This book is an extension and translation of his Welsh novel Rhaid i Bopeth Newid, but in no way reads like a translation. It is, indeed, so signifi-candy augmented as to stand as a new novel in its own right. In it, expected enemies may become friends, and former comrades weaken. "The book certainly reflects its title - though early on, with both women standing firmly by their radical beliefs, the 'must' of Everything Must Change seems more an imperative than an affirmative. "His keen observation is not limited to his main characters; he challenges prejudices on both sides of die language issue and draws a series of scathing, yet somehow sympathetic, images of Welsh society - activists, media and religious figures, politicians and city dwellers. He counterbalances these with Simone Weil's search for personal activism and rejection of ideology in an increasingly totalitarian twentieth century Europe, frequently utilising the philosopher's own words. "His writing, which displays a strong visual element, often looks darkly at the ambiguities and conflicts of Welsh identity. The locally owned cafe in the Welsh heartland is unwelcoming and scruffy; the First Minister's incipient readiness to listen and compromise founders in face of Meinwen's hectoring. Her former mentor succeeds only in boring his ragbag of fellow protesters, "capitalism's sulky runaway children", by speaking far too long. "Yet, Grahame Davies also reflects one of his characters' "wary optimism" about Wales's future. "This is a serious
book but not a heavy one; there is wry humour, the narrative progresses
at a good pace, and scenes interleave like filmic episodes. In short it's
well worth reading."
"True
to form, Grahame Davies – in his third volume of poetry – succeeds in
striking a chord with his audience... The variety of metres, the depth
of the expression and the combination of the mischievous and the profound
mean that Achos will appeal to readers of all kinds. There's a
definite statement here about our situation today as contemporary Welsh
people. This is a volume worth having." "Grahame
Davies's is a consciously public voice... His satirical poems about the
life of the Welsh-speaking middle class community in west Cardiff (of
which he is himself part) have long earned their place in slams and readings
by virtue of their provocative wit, their smooth metres, and their zestfully
shameless wordplay.
. . in his sonnets and villanelles (a very brave measure for anyone
to venture in the face of 'Do not go gentle...') and some of his other
rhyme-and-metre poems in this volume, Grahame Davies has succeeded in
fusing the polemical and the lyrical together in straightforward diction,
which confirms his place as one of the clearest public poetic voices of
his generation, and which justifies his commitment to following that path."
"Grahame
Davies has remained true to his vision in this volume too, possibly at
the expense of endangering his good name as a nationalist. The cross-examination
and the doubting in court and session is fiercely honest, with the satire
biting to the bone. Yet, beneath it all there is a longing for a fairer
Wales and a better world, and love for people and for language forces
its way through the hard earth of the bitter words." "This
latest volume by Grahame Davies is worth buying if only to read the long
poem 'Muriau'. This is the poet at his best: simple imagery, a strong
voice and a detailed knowledge of people's needs and convictions. The
poet is one who can sympathise with the intensity of a cause and a conviction,
and he sets us in the midst of the shock and tragedy of the lives of nine
men particularly well."
"The Big Book of Cardiff is an anthology full of lively writing about the city. The almost 60 items include poems, snatches of biography and history as well as extracts from novels. Around a quarter of them have been translated from the original Welsh. . . Among the joys of an anthology like this for an English-speaker is the chance it affords to encounter Welsh-language writers you may have heard of but have had little chance to read. The revelations for me include the beautifully written, poignant extract from Owen Martell's acclaimed novel, Dyn yr Eiliad. The sample of prose from Sonia Edwards's novel, Merch Noeth, is equally impressive. "Among the English language works, I found the extract from Tom Davies's previously unpublished memoirs both very funny and moving. His reminiscences about his days as a steward aboard Cardiff's paddle steamers plying their trade between Cardiff, Penarth and the coast of South West England precisely recreate the atmosphere of decaying pretension and gentility those who travelled on the boats will remember. "The poetry includes the strong, sinuous verse of twice Eisteddfod Crown-winner T James Jones which caught my eye as did the series of poems on the difficulties and rewards of learning Welsh by Ifor ap Glyn. The work of both poets had been translated from the Welsh. "One of the most revealing and sympathetic of the non-fiction pieces comes from John Williams. His brief history of the legend of Tiger Bay is testament to the simple, often innocent, lifestyle of the mixed and colourful population of that famous part of the city. The area had a fearsome reputation for crime and violence. But as the piece shows, life there was often gentler with a far stronger sense of community than in the rest of the city which so often looked down on it. "The
Big Book of Cardiff is a tribute to the strength of creative writing in
and about the city."
'So, perhaps
post-devolution literature is only just beginning to be written. And there
is one novel, more philosophically weighty than those we have been discussing,
which reminds me of Jean-Paul Sartre's 1940s trilogy, Les Chemins de
la Liberté (Paths of Liberty), namely Grahame Davies's novel, Rhaid
i Bopeth Newid. Here, within the framework of a dual narrative, (one
about Simone Weil, the French-Jewish semi-Catholic philosopher, and the
other about the Welsh and Welsh-language campaigner, Meinwen Jones) is
set forth the Welsh post-nationalistic choice. This is the first post-national
novel, that could not have been written except in the post-devolution
period. There's Simone the saint, dying of tuberculosis, losing her life
in her extreme religious and ideological commitment, and Meinwen in prison
choosing the path of conventional politics - the television studio and
the political debate - rather than suicide through hunger strike. "It's
the tactics of the water not the tactics of the sandcastle - yielding
here, gaining there. . .".' Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas in Taliesin, Volume 126, Winter 2005, page. 21.
"Grahame
Davies's Rhaid i Bopeth Newid (Everything Must Change) runs two
stories in tandem. One is an account of the life of Simone Weil, the philosophical
writer and Jewish member of the French academic elite between the two
World Wars which is cleverly paralleled with the language campaigning
trajectory of Meinwen Jones...This is a rigorously intelligent and challenging
book, and I for one was fascinated to learn more about Weil and her intellectual
stubbornness. Here was a woman who did manual labour on farms, worked
in a car factory and served with the Republican forces in the Spanish
Civil War. She stood up for what she believed in, as does Meinwen, willing
to be grilled on live television, depriving herself, fighting the (for
her) good fight. The novel's analysis of the ways in which the language
has been defended makes for provocative reading, as some of the splenetic
reviews in the Welsh language press have shown, suggesting that the author
has made a point, even if it is too sharp for some." "Essential
reading material for anyone who wants to get under the skin of the debate
relating to the Welsh language, - and that from both sides, as it were.
A truly excellent novel." "I had an epiphany while reading this novel. After struggling throught he first 20 pages without finding much in it, and putting it aside for a month, I picked it up an enjoyed it immensely. "Why? "Well, because I had been reading it in the wrong way. I went to it initially to read it as an intense, poignant book. Yes, it's that kind of story - no story dealing with a Jewish woman in France during the Second World War could be otherwise - but in doing this, I missed an element of what Davies was trying to do. "The
thing is, Davies is totally aware of the tragic/bathetic comedi which
is present in characters who live for a 'cause'." "This
is a novel which deals with the political situation of our age – the age
of the Assembly – and it provides an intelligent, detailed and shrewd
analysis of different aspects of life in Wales, particularly the situation
of the Welsh language. The words ‘a book for anyone who takes an interest
in the Welsh language’ have become something of a dull cliche, but they
are words which are completely true in the case of this novel. And as
Meinwen faces hard questions about the purpose of her sacrifice and the
meaning of her life - as she stands on the threshold of her fortieth birthday
- her situation is a painful but provocative reflection of the situation
of many of us today. As a portrayal of contemporary Wales - well, Welsh-speaking
Wales at least - in all its multi-layered complexity, it's unbeatable." "This
work deserves the highest praise for the engaging way in which the author
has succeeded in portraying Simone and Meinwen, but also for the way it
suggests what are the true values of life. Here is the practice of philosophy
/ theology at its best as the author deals with the traditional truths,
that the God who reveals is also the God who hides himself. (Deus revelatus
et absconditus). . . This novel is to be thanked for giving us a fresh
insight into an old mystery." "The
satire again is sharp and witty and ideas are discussed in a lively and
interesting way. There is an excellent description of one of the Assembly
committees taking evidence from Professor Mallwyd Price, and much is made
of the ignorance of the chairwoman, Gloria Milde." "In
terms of its method, it's a clever novel which jumps back and forward
between the present and the past, between the life of Meinwen Jones and
the life of Simone Weil.... Certainly, the historical references are one
of this novel's strengths. It's full of references to events between the
two world wars. In addition, we see some of the problems facing Wales
at the beginning of this century." "Ideas,
rather than psychology, are its strength, and the way it analyses life
in contemporary Wales. It deals with the situation of the Welsh language
and the nature of rural communities in a society which is inevitably changing,
for better and for worse. An old theme, it's true, but one that it is
worth getting to grips with, especially when it is presented in an entertaining
and provocative way, as is done in this readable novel."
"...this admirable book. Grahame Davies has gathered together a wide range of comments by Gentile Welsh writers on the Jews and by Jewish Welsh writers on the Welsh. They range from a translation of the editor's own moving poem to Merthyr's Jewish cemetery to a selection of Dannie Abse's splendid reminiscences, from Lord Elwyn-Jones's memories of the Nuremberg trials to Mimi Josephson's memorable portrayal of her loyalty to Wales and to Israel. The editor has not shirked the duty of including Welsh anti-semitic comments, the worst example of which is an extraordinarily vicious passage by that Welsh icon, Owen M. Edwards. "The extracts are linked by the editor's sensitive commentary, which is particularly perceptive where Saunders Lewis is concerned. Unlike some Welsh commentators, Grahame Davies is not in the business of exculpation. One of the themes running through the book is the Welsh predeliction for giving Hebrew names to their chapels, names which were frequently adopted as place-names. Perhaps the matter could have been pursued statistically. The Calvinistic Methodists' Handbook of 1911 lists 310 chapels which, between them, bore a total of 51 biblical names. The top ten were Penuel (22), Bethel (20), Carmel (16), Salem (16), Seion (16), Bethania (15) Bethlehem (13), Hermon (12), Tabernacl (11) and Saron (11). At the bottom of the list, with only one apiece, were Berea, Cedron, Bozrah, Dothan, Gerizim, Caesarea, Gilgal, Golan, Gibea, Pharan, and curiously enough, Calfaria. Another theme is the degree to which Welsh philo-semitism – based on the bible-olatry of the country's Nonconformity – inspired Lloyd George to authorize the promulgation of the Balfour Declaration, the declaration central to the process which eventually led to the establishment of the state of Israel. The book contains an extract from a speech Lloyd George made in 1925, when he reminded the Jewish Historical Society of England that 'Palestine was never a land exclusively of Jews'. It is a reminder which the present leaders of Israel should ponder." Dr John Davies on gwales.com
'Grahame Davies's "Rough Guide" is a witty reflection on the risks and freedoms of Welsh marginality, a marginality that paradoxically brings new connections and new communities." Patrick McGuinness, 'Where's the Ghetto', Times Literary Supplement, January 28, 2005.
A bilingual anthology of new Welsh poets "A model
anthology," "Of all the
anthologies published this year, the one to which I find myself turning
most often is Oxygen", "Oxygen brings together a wealth of contemporary poets from Wales, showcasing a fine range of voices, styles and approaches that underscore the current vein of writing emerging from this country. Confident, audacious and often very wise, this book is both a welcome and necessary demonstration of the creative and artistic skill that such a culturally rich country as Wales is producing. Through combining work written in English and Welsh, the book also shows that a poetic spirit is alive and practised in both linguistic mediums. As Amy Wack expounds in her introduction, "Wales does reasonably well in the production of poets" considering the size of its population. Indeed, both editors of Oxygen are to be praised for their judicious and exciting selection. It is a book that, above all, proves writing in Wales continues to develop and grow. The poets provide an emotional sophistication and intellectual agility that endows many compositions with a fierce, uncompromising energy. These are poems of elegance and insight, equally effective whether probing private feeling or exploring public spaces. Serious thought and ironic vigour successfully meld in shaping this book's depth of resonance. You sense from these poets a sincere and committed engagement with their material. Moreover, their choice of language is telling and their verse carefully etched. Reinforcing the skills and daring accomplished by earlier generations of Welsh poets, Oxygen confirms that literary talent in Wales continues to breathe with confidence and with verve. The trenchant work of this present ensemble should be congratulated and finely nurtured." David Wareham on gwales.com Oxygen
has also
been featured on a special radio programme in Australia here.
"Davies, especially, tackles contemporary Wales head-on, sardonically portraying the cardiff bourgeouisie in 'Coch/Red' and 'Calan Haf/Summer Solstice', the axeman/dyn y fwyell destroying careers in 'Gwreichionen/Spark' and the Welsh tendency to side with the underdog in 'Rough Guide'. Perhaps most memorably of all, he answers the question once posed by a French Marxist philosopher ("Can there be a Welsh Lara Croft?") in 'Tomb Raider': Mae'n dod
i gipion'n chwedlau She's coming
to the archives Wayne Burrows in Poetry Wales, Vol 38, No 2, Autumn 2002.
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