If you are going on holiday to some boring place like Lanzarote or Malta, take it with you. It would be good to read each poem, preferably aloud, against some unsuitable background... Only through an anthology of this range and depth, covering a century of writing, can one see how the styles and substances change.
- Roundyhouse Magazine

Poetry 1900-2000 is ... a cultural act, and a landmark in the English language writing of Wales. It is by far the most comprehensive collection of Welsh poetry in English in the Twentieth-century which we have had – or are likely to have.
- Tony Brown, Cambria

Synopsis:

Poetry 1900-2000 brings together a vibrant expression of the industrial, pastoral, rural, urban, religious, political and linguistic experience of Wales in the twentieth century world. The poetry collected here is as varied as Wales itself, and ranges from the well known to the startling, from the lyrical to the experimental, the celebration of tradition to that of protest. Each poet’s biography situates the writer in a social and literary context, and the collection presents an unparalleled panorama of the development of Welsh poetry in English in the twentieth century.

About the author:

Contains work from; W.H Davies, Huw Menai, A.G Prys-Jones, Wyn Griffith, David Jones, Eiluned Lewis, Gwyn Williams, Idris Davies, Glyn Jones, Vernon Watkins, Margiad Evans, Lynette Roberts, Jean Earle, Tom Earley, Brenda Chamberlain, R.S Thomas, Dylan Thomas, Alun Lewis, Keidrych Rhys, Roland Mathias, Emyr Humphreys, Harri Webb, John Stuart Williams, T.H Jones, Robert Morgan, Peter Hellings, Leslie Norris, Ruth Bidgood, John Ormond, Dannie Abse, Alison Bielski, Raymond Garlick, Mercer Simpson, John Tripp, Joseph P. Clancy, Douglas Phillips, Brian Norris, Tony Conran, Herbert Williams, Daniel Huws, Brian Aspden, Bryn Griffiths, Stuart Evans, Jon Dressel, Sam Adams, Sally Roberts Jones, Peter Gruffydd, Anne Cluysenaar, John Powell Ward, Alun Rees, Gillian Clarke, John Idris Jones, Meic Stephens, Graham Allen, John Barnie, Chris Torrance, Jeremy Hooker, John Pook, Alan Perry, Christine Evans, John Davies, Graham Thomas, Paul Evans, Richard Poole, Duncan Bush, Tony Curtis, Pennyanne Windsor, Andrew McNeillie, Douglas Houston, David Hughes, Paul Groves, Peter Finch, Glenda Beagan, Robert Walton, Nigel Jenkins, Steve Griffiths, Ifor Thomas, Sheenagh Pugh, Rowan Williams, Hillary Llewellyn-Williams, Robert Minhinnick, Pascale Petit, Mike Jenkins, Christopher Meredith, Huw Jones, Richard Gwyn, Catherine Fisher, Oliver Reynolds, Gwyneth Lewis, Paul Henry, Fiona Owen, Stephen Knight, Anna Wigley, Patrick Jones, Samantha Wynne Rhydderch, Deryn Rees-Jones, Frances Williams, Lloyd Robson, Kathryn Gray, and Owen Sheers.

Short extract:

A preface is literally that, a saying or writing beforehand. Usually, though, they are written afterwards, after a reading of the contents. The purpose especially of the preface to a book such as this is usually to explain or justify what is in it or even to persuade a potential reader to buy it. In the case of this volume in this series this is hardly necessary. After all, the series itself came about in 2005 when the then Minister for Culture in the Welsh Government, Alun Pugh AM, accepted a recommendation from the Culture Committee of the National Assembly that such a series should be funded and published and placed in all schools and libraries. The series is itself a cultural act, yet another feature of the nation-building that had been going on throughout the twentieth century but has proceeded apace since its turn into the twenty-first.

Buy:

Buy Poetry 1900-2000 from the Parthian online bookstore for £15.99