After literature written in the classical languages literature in the Welsh language is the oldest surviving literature in Europe. The Welsh literary tradition stretches from the 6th century to the twenty-first. Its fortunes have fluctuated over the centuries, in line with those of the Welsh language. Even today the language of the early Middle Ages is recognisable to some modern-day Welsh speakers.
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The core tradition was praise poetry and the poet Taliesin was regarded as the first in the line. The other aspect of the tradition was the professionalism of the poets and their reliance on patronage – from kings, princes and nobles in their turn – for their living. The fall of the principality of Gwynedd and the loss of any form of Welsh independence in 1282 did prove a crisis in the tradition but a crisis which was overcome. It led to the innovation – the development of the cywydd meter, a more loose definition of praise, and a reliance on the nobility for patronage.
The professionalism of the poetic tradition was sustained by a Guild of poets, or Order of bards, with its own 'rule book'. This 'rule book' emphasised their professionalism and that the making of poetry as a craft. Under its rules it took an apprenticeship of nine years for a poet to become fully qualified. The rules also set out the payment a poet could expect for his work – these payments varied according to how long a poet had been in training and also the demand for poetry at particular times during the year.
But kings, princes and nobles not only had their court poet, they also had their storyteller (Welsh: cyfarwydd). Like poets, the storytellers were also professionals; but, unlike the poets, little of their work has survived. What has survived are literary creations based on native Welsh tales which would have been told by the storytellers. These tales are usually known as the Mabinogion.
Welsh prose in the Middle Ages was not confined to the story tradition; it included a large body of both religious and practical works, in addition to a large amount translated from other languages.
The 16th century and 17th century in Wales, as in the rest of Europe, were a period of great change. Politically, socially, and economically the foundations of modern Wales were laid at this time. In the Laws in Wales Acts 1535-1542 Wales was annexed and integrated fully into the English kingdom, losing any vestiges of political or legal independence. The political-religious settlement of Elizabeth I through the 1559 Act of Uniformity made Wales in name a Protestant country only to be reinforced by developments during and after the English Civil War. This period also saw the beginnings of industries such as coal mining, metal-mining for lead and iron smelting, which led to the mass industrialisation of the following centuries.
From the middle of the 16th century onwards a decline is seen in the praise tradition of the poets of the Nobility, the cywyddwyr. It became more and more difficult for poets to make their living from the craft of poetry. This happened primarily for social reasons beyond their control. The Dissolution of the Monasteries, that had become important sources of patronages for the poets, and the Anglicisation of the nobility during the period of the Tudors, exemplified by the Laws in Wales Acts, meant that there were fewer and fewer patrons willing or able to support the poets. But there were also internal reasons for the decline: the conservatism of the Guild of poets, or, Order of bards, made it very difficult for it to adapt to the new world of renaissance learning and the growth of printing.
However, the Welsh poetic tradition of the traditional meters and cynghanedd did not disappear completely, although it did lose it professionalism, and came into the hands of 'ordinary' poets who kept it alive through centuries. Cynghanedd and traditional meters are still used today by very many Welsh-language poets.
Without a university of its own, without other learning institutions, without even a court and courtiers of its own, Wales was not in a very good position to participate fully in the revolution in ideas and scholarship, which is usually termed the Renaissance. Wales did not really have any towns of great significance at this time which could have acted as centres for the type of society where such ideas and movements flourish. But the renaissance did hit Wales in no uncertain terms, and that due to the commitment of certain individuals, both Protestant and Catholic, in ensuring that the Welsh language would be part of this new movement.
In 1546 the first book to be printed in Welsh was published, Yn y llyvyr hwnn (=In this book…) by Sir John Price of Brecon. John Price (ca.1502-55) was an aristocrat and an important civil servant. He served as Secretary of the Council of Wales and the Marches and he was also one of the officers responsible for administrating the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the area. He was also a scholar who embraced the latest ideas relating to religion and learning: reform and humanism. It is also known that he was a collector of manuscripts on various subjects, including the history and literature of Wales.
Shortly afterwards the works of William Salesbury began to appear. Salesbury was an ardent Protestant and coupled his learning with the new religious ideas from the continent; he translated the New Testament into Welsh and authored an English-Welsh dictionary among other works. On the other hand, Gruffudd Robert was an ardent Catholic, but in the same spirit of learning published an important Welsh grammar while in enforced exile in Milan in 1567. A huge step forward for both the Welsh language and its literature was the publication, in 1588, of a full-scale translation of the Bible by William Morgan.
Most of the works published in the Welsh language for at least the next century were religious in nature. Morgan Llwyd, a Puritan, wrote in both English and Welsh, recounting his spiritual experiences. Other notable writers of the period included Vavasor Powell.
During this period, poetry also began to take a religious turn, in terms of subject matter. William Pugh was a Royalist and a Catholic. By now, women as well as men were writing, but little of their work can be identified. Katherine Philips of Cardigan Priory, although English by birth, lived in Wales for most of her life, and was at the centre of a literary coterie comprising both genders.
The seeds of Anglo-Welsh literature can also be detected, particularly in the work of Henry Vaughan and his contemporary, George Herbert, both Royalists.
In the 18th century the trend in favour of religious literature continued and grew even stronger as Nonconformism began to take hold of Wales. The Welsh Methodist revival, initially led by Howell Harris and Daniel Rowland, produced not only sermons and religious tracts, but also hymns and poetry by William Williams Pantycelyn, Ann Griffiths and others. The Morris brothers of Anglesey were leading figures in the establishment of the London Welsh societies, and their letters to one another are an important record of the time. The activities of the London Welshmen helped ensure that Wales retained some kind of profile within Britain as a whole.
The activities of a number of individuals, including Thomas Jones of Corwen and the Glamorgan stonemason and man of letters, Iolo Morganwg, led to the revival of the National Eisteddfod of Wales and the invention of many of the traditions which surround it today. Although Iolo is sometimes called a charlatan because so many of his discoveries were based on pure myth, he was also an inveterate collector of old manuscripts and thereby did perform a service without which Welsh literature would have been the poorer. Some of the Welsh gentry continued to patronise bards, but this practice was gradually dying out.
Largely as a result of the Industrial Revolution, there was a large influx of people into the South Wales Valleys during the 19th century. Although many of them were English, some made an effort to learn the Welsh language in order to integrate themselves with the local communities, and there was increased demand for literature in the form of books, periodicals, newspapers, poetry, ballads and sermons. Some of the more wealthy incomers, such as Lady Charlotte Guest, Lady Llanover and others, were of active assistance in the trend towards a richer cultural life. Thanks partly to the eisteddfod network, writing became a popular pastime, and all forms of poetry thrived.
Poets now used their bardic names to disguise their identity in competitions, and continued to use them when they became well known. The most celebrated poets of the century were: Evan Evans (Ieuan Glan Geirionydd), John Blackwell, William Thomas and John Ceiriog Hughes, who went by the bardic names of "Ieuan Glan Geirionydd", "Alun", "Islwyn" and "Ceiriog" respectively.
The novel had been slow to pick up momentum in Wales. Translations of works such as Uncle Tom's Cabin existed, but the first recognised novelist in the Welsh language was Daniel Owen, author of Rhys Lewis (1885) and Enoc Huws (1891), among others.
In the late 19th and early 20th century, Welsh literature began to reflect the way the Welsh language was increasingly becoming a political symbol. Two of the greatest figures in the literary history of this period were the prolific Saunders Lewis and the writer/publisher Kate Roberts. Lewis, who had been brought up in Liverpool, was a leader of the nationalist movement, jailed for his part in protests; he chose drama as a means of drawing attention to the rightness of his cause. Novelist Kate Roberts worked as a teacher, and was one of few writers to have lived in and written about both North Wales and South Wales.
The industrialisation of parts of Wales was now beginning to be regarded as a mixed blessing, and the old agricultural agrarian way of life which persisted in most of the country was idealised by many writers. However, a more realistic picture of Gwynedd farming communities between the Wars was presented by John Ellis Williams (1924-) in both English and Welsh. Publication of these reminiscences appeared in community newspapers, the Countryman magazine and subsequently in paperback format in English under the titles of Clouds of Time and other Stories (1989) and Rare Welsh Bits (2000). A free spirit in the Welsh publishing circle, Williams was neither an academic nor a politician, but had embraced Existensialism in post Second World War France and had an active friendship and correspondence with Simone de Beauvoir. The 1940s also saw the creation of a notable writing group in the Rhondda, called the 'Cadwgan Circle'. Writing almost entirely in the Welsh language, the movement, formed by J. Gwyn Griffiths and his wife Käte Bosse-Griffiths, included the Welsh writers Pennar Davies, Rhydwen Williams, James Kitchener Davies and Gareth Alban Davies.
After a relatively quiet period between 1950-1970, large numbers of Welsh language novels began appearing from the 1980s onwards, with such authors as Aled Islwyn and Angharad Tomos. In the 1990s there was a distinct trend towards postmodernism in Welsh prose writing, especially evident in the work of such authors as Wiliam Owen Roberts and Mihangel Morgan.
Meanwhile, Welsh poetry, which had been verging on stagnation, took on a new lease of life as poets sought to regain mastery over the traditional verse forms, partly to make a political point. Alan Llwyd and Dic Jones were leaders in the field. Female poets such as Menna Elfyn gradually began to make their voices heard, overcoming the obstacle of the male-dominated bardic circle and its conventions.
The scholar Sir Ifor Williams also pioneered scientific study of the earliest Welsh written literature, as well as the Welsh language, recovering the works of poets like Taliesin and Aneirin from the uncritical fancies of various antiquarians, such as the Reverend Edward Davies who believed the theme of Aneirin's Gododdin is the massacre of the Britons at Stonehenge in 472.
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