Languages

In this epistolary short story, a Welsh missionary goes to Japan but ends up converting to a new way of life.   Listen to Llŷr Gwyn Lewis read "Dolores Morgan's Letters from the Far East" in the original Welsh     Kyoto, 1868 Letters in the hand of Dolores Morgan, a missionary for the Union of Welsh Baptists, to her friend Leila Farr Bevan. The Union was a new body that sent missionaries to Japan soon after the country changed its long-standing policy...

A woman and her son fight to survive in a postapocalyptic landscape in this excerpt from the Wales Book of the Year. Siôn  Mam says that it's best to write like this now. Because she can't be bothered to teach me, I think. Can't be bothered or can't find the energy. I'm not sure which it is. Or if there's any difference.  She used to sit with me for an hour each morning, the hour when Dwynwen sleeps. Stuff like adding and reading. Not like we...

The foundations of a house and a marriage are both under siege in this short story by Caryl Lewis. She was taking the wet clothes out of the twin tub when she spotted the tile. She had rolled her sleeves up and lifted the damp clothes into the basket, ready to hang them on the line. She had kept the water from the first wash for the second load, and it was now clouded with muck and bits of fluff and grass seeds. She listened to the pumping of the machine, like a heartbeat driving out...

A library porter is left alone on duty and plans to take advantage of it in this excerpt from Fflur Dafydd's novel The Library.   As he did every morning, Dan walked down the red carpet toward the entrance of the National Library, knowing that the whole world waited for him behind those doors. There was a beautiful stillness in this moment, a superiority which thrilled him as he walked along that strip of red, as though toward an audience hungry for his arrival. But once...

Llwyd Owen imagines a Wales where the Welsh language itself is a crime in this excerpt from his novella Iaith y Nefoedd (The Language of Heaven).  He opened his eyes.  He checked his phone. “Shit!” Half past one in the afternoon. Not that he’d missed an important appointment or anything. Just half a day. Another one. Same as yesterday. And the day before. And the one before that too. Not that he can remember properly. Manon’s fault, for sure....

For the English translation, please click here. Dim ond geiriau yn fy mhen ydyn nhw bellach a finnau'n cau fy llygaid. Dwi'n cau fy llygaid a'm clustiau am byth o sŵn y syrcas a dringo'r llwybrau tua'r lle mae Wil Pont Ucha Braich yn aros amdanaf. Abwyd i ladron, meddai'r papurau, oedd y sofran yn ei boced. Sgwn i ddaru amser rewi iddo fyntau ac yntau'n clywed blas, clywed sŵn, clywed poen a gweld y byd ar un amrantiad? Chwarddodd y giang wrth ddal...

In Bod Iwan there have long been gods of words and gods of song, gods with feet sound upon this earth, wild gods and wise gods, for what it's worth: Gerallt, who's followed all the trails from Madryn back again to Wales and Edmwnd, Edmwnd who knows that sense and sound are more than shows; the great water and the smallest birds are all in Ieuan's quiet words: Two came to Bod Iwan's table, two whose words were a fiery fable, smoking words on a far flung plain and Camwy...

When I close my ears to the sounds of this circus my eyes rise to the paths where Will High-Bridge-Arm waits for me. The papers said it was the sovereign in his pocket that was bait for thieves. I wonder whether time froze for him as he tasted, heard, felt the pain of the world passing by him? The gang laughed at him as they caught the glint of moon in his gold coin. Will High-Bridge-Arm sank into oblivion's fountain. When he rose from the water the world was changed. Where the fields...

Davies, Anna, and Daniel have been as close as three people can be. But now Davies is dead in a car crash, and the two that are left must "take on the case": Davies' life, their own lives, and the whole of their shared past. Who, and what, was Davies? Did they know him at all? And why is he still, even now, hiding from them? In this extract, from chapter 7, Daniel recounts a story told to him by Davies. Through the details and ambiguities of the recounted story―an allegorical...

(at the Llanelwedd National Eisteddfod) The border is near, its rugged soil continuing to sear its history on the face of our language's acres, our no man's land. Our language is Llywelyn's faint breath on these stones, challenging others to utter it, and stir over its existence. I catch it, imagine it as a leaden rain, a featherbed, our soul, our secret, blush of life, a little darling: a moment, a messenger, a song, a feint, a swooping owl, the cry of an embrace, a fright,...

For the English translation, please click here. (ar achlysur Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Llanelwedd) Mae'r ffin yn y cyffiniau, pridd ei gwytnwch yn parhau i serio'i hanes ar wyneb erwau ein hiaith, ein tir neb. Isel anadl Llywelyn yw'n hiaith uwch y meini hyn, yn herio mwy i'w siarad a chyffroi uwch ei pharhad. Rwy'n ei dal, ei dyfalu yn law plwm, yn wely plu, ein henaid, ein cyfrinach, yn wrid byw, yn gariad bach: èn eiliad, yn...