Archive for 2017
Domenico Scarlatti and Basil Bunting
Under his full wig he looks like a successful but no-nonsense, even grumpy eighteenth century aristocrat or businessman. It would be hard to guess, if you didn’t know, that this is Domenico Scarlatti, the composer of the most inventive, quirky and joyful Baroque music ever written. Born in Naples in the same year as Bach […]
Two Scilly visitors
On 22 October 1707 Admiral Sir Cloudsley Shovell was guiding his fleet of fifteen Royal Navy ships back towards the England coast after a failed attempt to defeat the French fleet near the Mediterranean port of Toulon during the War of the Spanish Succession. It was a difficult voyage. The weather was stormy, and Shovell, […]
Y Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol
Dyma destun anerchiad i Gynulliad Blynyddol y Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol a gynhaliwyd yn y Neuadd Fawr, Prifysgol Abertawe ar 8 Mawrth 2017. Bum mlynedd ar hugain yn ôl des i i Brifysgol Abertawe, neu Goleg y Brifysgol Abertawe fel yr oedd hi ar y pryd, i fod yn gyfrifol am ei Llyfrgell – syndod mawr, […]
The socialist submariner
My friend J. asked me the other day whether as a child I’d read stories set in schools. I said I couldn’t recall reading any, despite being a greedy reader – unless you counted Tom Brown’s schooldays, a present from some well-intentioned aunt, which I found unreadable and never finished. The only explanation I could […]
George Ace, pioneer cyclist
Wandering among the memory theatres of Wales over the last year or two I’ve come across some fine institutions, some striking objects and some remarkable characters. In Tenby Museum they remember the happily named George Ace, a distinguished figure from the heroic days of cycling. George Ace was born in 1861 and came from Swansea. […]
Philip Gross’s ‘Betweenland’
A while ago, I can’t now remember where, I saw a relief map of Britain as it might be a few centuries from now. Most of England was under water, though Wales and Scotland were largely intact. The queues at the borders, it occurred to me, will be lengthy. Many people prefer to turn their […]
Y Garn Goch
Bûm yna am y tro cyntaf rhywbryd tua diwedd y 1970au. Cofiaf ddilyn y lôn gul, droellog o wastatir afon Tywi, i fyny’r rhiw o bentref Bethlehem, cyn parcio’r car ar droed y llwybr. Cofiaf hefyd y waliau cerrig sychion yn amgylchynu’r ddau fryn, yn ddiamddiffyn i’r gwyntoedd o’r gorllewin – neu’n waeth, gwyntoedd dwyreiniol […]
Phil Eglin’s wobbly jugs
Haptic art is alive. Marcel Duchamp’s pale followers have failed, over the last hundred years, to snuff out the pleasure of making things with your hands. Squeezing red acrylic paint out of a tube and trailing it with a finger over a canvas still has irresistible appeal. So does mixing and shaping clay and hardening […]
Turner at Ewenny: a political artist?
Recently I’ve been looking into the strange fate of Ewenny Priory at the time of its dissolution in the 1530s and 1540s. Sooner or later anyone interested in the history of the priory can hardly escape an encounter with the remarkable watercolour of the church’s interior that JMW Turner painted in 1797, when he was […]
Are angels real?
Walking through Mumbles a few weeks ago I glanced up at the noticeboard on the Christadelphian ecclesia (Mount Zion Hall) advertising the topic for the next meeting. Normally the wording takes the form of ‘What does the Bible say about x?’, where ‘x’ is a current concern, like adultery or climate change or the colour purple. On […]