Owen Glynne Jones on Cader Idris

Owen Glynne Jones, everyone agreed, was the outstanding rock climber of his age. Born in London in 1867 of Welsh-speaking parents and educated in science and engineering, he made his name by pioneering new routes in the English Lake District, and from 1891 he became internationally famous for his climbs in the Alps. A natural […]
The courage of Thomas Thrush

Less than four miles from Kilburn, my brother’s home in north Yorkshire till his death last November, is the village of Sutton-under-Whitestonecliffe. It sits at the foot of the steep escarpment known as Sutton Bank, on the main road between Thirsk and Scarborough. Sutton was the home in the 1820s of a remarkable but little-known […]
‘Mwy o sgwennwrs na darllenwrs’: yr argyfwng geiriau

Yn ei nofel ddeifiol newydd Hunllef Nadolig Eben Parri mae Arwel Vittle yn anelu ei arfau dychanol at dargedau niferus yn y Gymru gyfoes. Un yw pobl sy’n ysgrifennu a chyhoeddi. Mae bron pob grŵp yn ei chael hi’n arw gan ‘Ysbryd Cymru Sydd’: cofiannau (‘gormod ohonyn nhw’), academyddion (‘digon o ddadansoddi a gor-ddadansoddi ôl-drefedigaethol […]
Farewell to Yorkshire

My parents used to tell me that when I was small I’d tell them that York Minster was, in my opinion, the best building in the world. Of course, I’d not seen much of the world then, just bits of Yorkshire and Scotland. But I didn’t let that shake my boyish confidence. After all, I […]
Myfyrdodau Mr Ebeneser Sgrwj ar ŵyl y Nadolig

Roedden ni’n trafod amser y Nadolig y dydd o’r blaen, a sut mae e wedi newid dros y blynyddoedd. Sut, er enghraifft, mae’r tymor yn dechrau – neu’n ymddangos i ddechrau – yn gynt ac yn gynt bob blwyddyn – llawer cyn diwedd mis Tachwedd. A sut mae’n llyncu mwy a mwy o amser ar […]
The other Capel-y-ffin

There were two other people, a man and his wife from Caerffili, at St Mary’s church when I visited Capel-y-ffin last week. They stood and shared my wonder at the wonky beauty of the tiny building, with its wooden bellcote, eighteenth-century pews and pulpit, and miniature staircase and gallery. As we left, we took photos […]
The bee boy

On 12 December 1775 Gilbert White, the naturalist of Selborne in Hampshire, wrote a letter to his friend Daines Barrington in which he recalled a remarkable character who had lived in the village ‘more than twenty years ago’. He doesn’t name the lad, and just refers to him as ‘an idiot boy’. What made him […]