The Library of Wales | Writing for the World

Win the entire Library of Wales series in the 2015 M. Wynn Thomas Prize!

About the prize

The M. Wynn Thomas Prize is offered to celebrate outstanding scholarly work in the field of Welsh writing in English. There are two prize categories: the ‘Open’ category and the ‘New Scholars’ category. Essays submitted may be unpublished or published, in English or in Welsh. Published essays should be from 2013/14. Topics may include all aspects of Welsh writing in English as well as the inter-relationship of Welsh writing in English with cognate areas (Welsh Studies, history, cultural studies, film/media studies, translation studies, performance/theatre studies, digital humanities, comparative literature etc.). The judging panel for the 2015 Prize will be Dr Matthew Francis (Aberystwyth University/University of Wales Trinity Saint David), Dr Aidan Byrne (University of Wolverhampton) and Dr Alyce von Rothkirch ( Swansea University).

The prize is awarded for a piece of substantial scholarship that is engagingly written. We encourage submissions that are ground-breaking in terms of subject-matter and/or methodology/disciplinarity. Essays that grapple with new ideas in an intelligent and conceptualised way are preferred. It is awarded at the annual conference of the Association of Welsh writing in English, which takes place around Easter every year in Gregynog Hall (near Newtown).

Prize categories:

‘Open’ Category

Essays in this category will be approximately 6,000-8,000 words long, of the highest scholarly quality and either already published in, or of a standard appropriate to an international, peer-reviewed journal. Authors may be academics or scholars, who are not affiliated with an HE institution.

Prize: £150 and a full set of the Library of Wales series of books published by Parthian.

‘New Scholars’ Category

Essays in this category will be approximately 4,000-7,000 words long and of highly developed scholarly quality appropriate to the author’s level of (postgraduate) study. Authors may be postgraduate students or students who have recently graduated.

Prize: £150 and a full set of the Library of Wales series of books published by Parthian.

Deadline:

Essays must be submitted by email or by post by 25 December 2014.

Contact Alyce von Rothkirch for more information and to submit your essays:

Dr Alyce von Rothkirch

DACE, Swansea University

Singleton Park

Swansea SA2 8PP

mwynnthomasprize@gmail.com

Dannie Abse 1923–2014

Dannie Abse

22 September 1923–28 September 2014

Dannie Abse was born in Cardiff in 1923 and grew up in the city. After studying at the Welsh National School of Medicine, he moved in 1943 to London where he continued

his medical studies at King’s College and Westminster Hospital; his military service was done in the RAF. Qualifying as a doctor in 1950, he worked as a specialist in a chest clinic on the fringes of Soho; he lived in Golders Green, but kept in touch with Wales through his support for Cardiff Football Club and his presidency of the Welsh Academy, the national association of writers, and for many years he had a home at Ogmore-by-sea; he also edited the anthology Twentieth Century Anglo-Welsh Poetry (1997). He published some sixteen books of verse; they include After Every Green Thing (1948), Walking under Water (1952), Tenants of the House (1957), A Small Desperation (1968), Funland (1973), Way Out in the Centre (1981), Ask the Bloody Horse (1986), On the Evening Road (1994), Arcadia: One Mile (1998) and Running Late (2007); many of his poems on Welsh themes are to be found in Welsh Retrospective (1997). He also wrote a number of prose works, mainly autobiographical, which include Ash on a Young Man’s Sleeve (1954) and A Poet in the Family (1974). His Collected Poems 1948-88, entitled White Coat Purple Coat, appeared in 1989 and his New and Collected Poems, nearly three hundred in all, in 2003; a small selection was published in the Corgi series as Touch Wood in 2002. At the heart of his work lay a fascination with the foibles of human nature and he reserved his warmest admiration for those who have refused to conform and have suffered as a consequence. As a Jew, albeit secular, he was particularly sensitive to political pressures; a stronger awareness of his Jewish identity came to the fore in his mature work and some of his later poems dealt specifically with the Holocaust. In all his verse there is, in about equal measure, a deep melancholy and a sheer delight in everyday experiences, some of which is based on his experiences as a doctor. His poems have a haunting power, in which there is a place for nostalgia, humour, irony, optimism and a delicious sense of the incongruous and mysterious. He died yesterday on September 28th 2014 at the age of 91.

Our thoughts go out to his family at this difficult time.

Title #39 in the Library of Wales series is revealed...

March 2014 saw the release of the outstanding Story anthology, the first volume of which contains six short stories written by Rhys Davies – the highest number of contributions from any author across both volumes. Therefore, it should be of no surprise that the Library of Wales has selected Rhys Davies’ 1937 text A Time to Laugh to be number 39 in its series of classic Welsh fiction.

The release, scheduled for fall 2014, follows on seven years after his last entry in the series – 2007’s The Withered Root – was published, and is the second novel in Davies’ critically acclaimed Rhondda Trilogy, which biographer Meic Stephens has called ‘the most sustained literary examination of Welsh industrial history ever published and certainly the least ideologically distorted’.

A Time to Laugh is set in a coal-mining valley on the eve of the 20th century, and takes place against a background of industrial unrest and social change. The old certainties of pastoral Rhondda have given way to a new age of capital and steam, and life in the Valley has been transformed by strike, riot and gruelling poverty.

The central character is Dr Tudor Morris, whose ancient estate has been sold to one of the railway companies opening up the Rhondda for the purpose of extracting coal and taking it down the Valley to the docks in Cardiff. The doctor abandons his class and seeks personal salvation among the poor.

About Rhys Davies

Rhys Davies (1901–1978) was one of the most prolific and unusual writers to emerge from the Welsh industrial valleys in the twentieth century. Born in Clydach Vale, a tributary valley of the Rhondda arising from Tonypandy, he was the fourth child of a

small grocer and an uncertified schoolteacher. He spurned conventional education and left the valley, which was to be the basis of much of his work, at the age of nineteen, settling in London, which was to remain his base until he died.

Early in his literary career, he travelled to the south of France where he was befriended by D. H. Lawrence, who remained an influence in his writing. Though sex remained, for Davies, the primary determinant of human relations, he differed radically from Lawrence in that he saw the struggle for power rather than love, either sexual or emotional, as the crucial factor.

Though the bulk of his work was in the novel he achieved his greatest distinction in the field of the short story. Having few predecessors, Welsh or English, he drew his inspiration and models from continental European and Russian masters; Chekhov and Maupassant, Tolstoy and Flaubert. His view of humanity was Classical in that he saw people as being identically motivated whether in biblical Israel, Ancient Greece or the Rhondda valley. Much of his output was concerned with women, who would almost invariably emerge triumphant from any conflict.

He was a gay man at a time when it was difficult to live openly with his sexuality. He lived alone for most of his life and avoided relationships which seemed to betoken commitment on his part. His closest friendships were with women. He avoided literary coteries and groups, though he might have joined several, and held no discernible religious or political convictions. He lived, to an intense degree, for his art.

Other publications

As has already been mentioned, Davies is no stranger to the Library of Wales, and his 1927 classic The Withered Root was the twelfth release in the series. The novel

recounts the troubled life of Reuben Daniels, reared in a South Wales industrial valley, in the bosom of the Nonconformist culture. Therein lies his downfall and that of his people, for The Withered Root is as thoroughly opposed to Welsh Nonconformity as My People (Caradoc Evans), though for different reasons. Revivalist passions constitute nothing but a perverse outlet for an all too human sexuality which chapel culture has otherwise repressed. Nonconformity has withered the root of natural sexual well-being in the Welsh, and then feeds off the twisted fruits.

In his article on the novel for Wales Arts Review, Jon Gower writes that 'The Withered Root is a rich evocation of a time when religion swept like wildfire through Wales. At times the author’s imagination blazes incredibly brightly, setting the very pages on fire. Rhys Davies really is one of our very best Welsh writers and almost criminally neglected.'

Last autumn also saw the release of Meic Stephens’ comprehensive biography of Davies – Rhys Davies: A Writer’s Life. Such a man, such a writer, presents challenges for the biographer which Meic Stephens accepts with alacrity. He describes the writer’s

early years as the Blaenclydach grocer’s son, his abhorrence of ‘chapel culture’, his bohemian years in Fitzrovia, his visit to the Lawrences in the south of France, his unremitting work ethic, his patrons, his admiration for the French and Russian writers who were his models, his love-hate relationship with the Rhondda, and above all, the dissembling that went into Print of a Hare’s Foot (1969), ‘an autobiographical beginning’, which he shows to be a most unreliable book from start to finish.

This is the first full biography of an important Welsh writer and a milestone in Welsh biographical writing. Drawing on hitherto unavailable sources, including many conversations with the writer’s brother, it provides a perspective in which his very real achievement can be more easily appreciated.

The Spectator states that ‘[Meic] has done more than justice...to the black humour of Davies’s writing and that of his life. This is a delightful book, which is itself a social history in its own right, and funny’, an opinion shared by Wales Arts Review, who agree that, 'in writing this informative, intriguing biography, Meic Stephens has done the reading public a great service, as Rhys Davies is clearly a writer who should be read more of by people not just in Wales but everywhere.’

A Time to Laugh will be released in autumn 2014.

31 Stories in May at Hay!: Day 31 ‘The Conquered’ by Dorothy Edwards

Every day throughout May, you will be able to visit the Library of Wales website to download your free story, drawn from Story, vols I and II - a collection boasting the finest Welsh short fiction ever written and featuring some of the most talented literary names from both past and present, including the legendary Dylan Thomas and the award-winning Rachel Trezise, as well as read all about the chosen author.

Day 31: ‘The Conquered' by Dorothy Edwards

(Taken from Rhapsody, 1927)

Dorothy Edwards was born in 1903 in Ogmore Vale, a small mining community in Mid Glamorgan. Her father, an ardent socialist and Independent Labour Party leader, was the local school headmaster. Like her father, she was politically active, working for socialist and Welsh nationalist causes, although she always wrote in English. After a scholarship to Howell's School for Girls, Llandaf, she took a degree at Cardiff University in Greek and Philosophy, but literature was her passion and soon after graduating her short stories began to appear in magazines and journals. These were collected in Rhapsody(1927), along with several previously unpublished stories written during the nine months Edwards spent in Vienna and Florence. Her novel Winter Sonata (1928) followed shortly afterwards. She spent the following years trying to supplement her mother’s meagre pension by writing stories and articles for magazines and newspapers, and doing some extra-mural teaching at Cardiff University, but she never undertook full-time employment. After a brief period spent living in London with acquaintances from the’ Bloomsbury circle, Edwards committed suicide on a Cardiff railway line in 1934. A note left in her pocket at the time of her death read: ‘I am killing myself because I have never sincerely loved any human being all my life. I have accepted kindness and friendship and even love without gratitude, and given nothing in return.'

You can download the story in PDF format here. (If download does not start, then right click the link and select 'Save link as'.)

Selected bibliography

Rhapsody (Library of Wales, 2007)

Contributed to

Story I (anthology) (Library of Wales, 2014)

31 Stories in May at Hay!: Day 30 - ‘The Gift of Tongues’ by Arthur Machen

Every day throughout May, you will be able to visit the Library of Wales website to download your free story, drawn from Story, vols I and II - a collection boasting the finest Welsh short fiction ever written and featuring some of the most talented literary names from both past and present, including the legendary Dylan Thomas and the award-winning Rachel Trezise, as well as read all about the chosen author.

Day 30: ‘The Gift of Tongues' by Arthur Machen

(Taken from T.P.’s and Cassell’s Weekly, issue dated Dec 3, 1927)

Born Arthur Llewelyn Jones in 1863 in Caerleon, Gwent, Machen was one of the most influential writers of the 1890s and early 20th century and is also well known for his leading role in creating the legend of the Angels of Mons, the group of angels who protected members of the British Army in the Battle of Mons at the outset of WWI.

Machen was baptised under his mother’s maiden name, and later used it as a pen name. He spent a solitary childhood in the Monmouthshire countryside, exploring the Black Mountains, the ancient forest of Wentwood and the Severn Valley. He drew on his childhood among these dark and mysterious landscapes full of Celtic, Roman and medieval history and long-buried pagan remains, interweaving it with his adult life in bohemian fin-de-siècle London, to create magical and often deeply disturbing tales.

When his father became vicar of the parish of Llanddewi Fach in 1864, he was brought up at their rectory, and since the age of eight he was interested in the occult, reading, amongst others, an article on alchemy in a volume of Household Words found in its library. At the age of eleven, Machen boarded at Hereford Cathedral School, where he received an excellent classical education, but, unable to complete his education due to his family’s poor finances, he moved to London with hopes of a medical career first, and a literary one then, when he published his first long poem, Eleusinia, in 1881. After a number of writing commissions, which included translating The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova, and his attempts to work as a journalist and as a children’s tutor, he published his first book, The Anatomy of Tobacco, in 1884.

However, it was in the 1890s that Machen achieved literary success and a reputation as a leading author of gothic texts, contemporary of Arthur Conan Doyle, Oscar Wilde and William Butler Yeats all of whom admired his work tremendously. In 1890 he published his classic horror novel The Great God Pan (1890), which was widely denounced for its sexual and horrific content but sold well, going into a second edition. He then wrote ‘The Shining Pyramid’ (1895) and The Three Impostors (1895), a novel composed of a number of interwoven tales, that were eventually to be regarded as among Machen's best works. Many of his works bear the imprint of the Welsh border country of his upbringing. Other stories were published much later, including The Hill of Dreams (1907), after the Oscar Wilde scandal, that made difficult for decadent writers to find a publisher for new works.

After his wife’s death, Machen became an actor and a member of Frank Benson's company of travelling players, a profession which took him round the country, and that led in 1903 to a second marriage. In 1906 though, Machen's literary career began once more to flourish as the book The House of Souls, a collection of his most notable works of the nineties, brought them to a new audience. In those years Machen was also investigating Celtic Christianity, the Holy Grail and King Arthur, concluding that the legends of the Grail were based on rites of the Celtic Church and that the Grail survived into modern times.

But it was the WWI that saw Machen return to public prominence due to the publicity surrounding the Angels of Mons episode and a series of stories on morale-boosting propaganda, and after the War he became a star on both sides of the Atlantic, and his great literary significance was recognized by H. P. Lovecraft, who described him as one of the four ‘modern masters of the horror story’.

In 1923 Machen completed his second volume of autobiography, Things Near and Far—the final volume, and in the late 1920s, facing financial hardship, he became a manuscript reader for the publisher Ernest Benn. His financial difficulties were only finally ended by the literary appeal launched in 1943 for Machen’s eightieth birthday, where the names included were Max Beerbohm, T. S. Eliot, Bernard Shaw, Walter de la Mare, Algernon Blackwood, and John Masefield. The success of the appeal allowed Machen to live the last few years of his life, until 1947, in relative comfort.

His fans today include Stephen King, Clive Barker, Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman, who have all emphasised their debt to Machen as ‘the forgotten father of weird fiction’ (The Guardian).

You can download the story in PDF format here. (If download does not start, then right click the link and select 'Save link as'.)

Selected bibliography

The Great God Pan (Library of Wales, 2010)

The Hill of Dreams (Library of Wales, 2010)

Contributed to

Story I (anthology) (Library of Wales, 2014)

31 Stories in May at Hay!: Day 29 - 'Mama's Baby (Papa's Maybe)' by Leonora Brito

Every day throughout May, you will be able to visit the Library of Wales website to download your free story, drawn from Story, vols I and II - a collection boasting the finest Welsh short fiction ever written and featuring some of the most talented literary names from both past and present, including the legendary Dylan Thomas and the award-winning Rachel Trezise, as well as read all about the chosen author.

Day 29: 'Mama's Baby (Papa's Maybe)' by Leonora Brito

(Taken from Mama's Baby (Papa's Maybe): New Welsh Short Fiction, 1999)

Leonora Brito was born in Cardiff. She studied law and history at Cardiff University. Her story ‘Dat’s Love’ won her the 1991 Rhys Davies Short Story Competition. She also wrote for radio and television, providing a unique insight into Afro-Caribbean Welsh society, largely unrepresented in Welsh writing until her work appeared. She published one collection of stories, Dat’s Love, in 1995. She died in 2007.

You can download the story in PDF format here. (If download does not start, then right click the link and select 'Save link as'.)

Selected bibliography

Contributed to

Story II (anthology) (Library of Wales, 2014)

Urban Welsh: New Welsh Fiction (Parthian, 2005)

31 Stories in May at Hay!: Day 28 - 'They Came' by Alun Lewis

Every day throughout May, you will be able to visit the Library of Wales website to download your free story, drawn from Story, vols I and II - a collection boasting the finest Welsh short fiction ever written and featuring some of the most talented literary names from both past and present, including the legendary Dylan Thomas and the award-winning Rachel Trezise, as well as read all about the chosen author.

Day 28: 'They Came' by Alun Lewis

(Taken from The Last Inspection and Other Stories, 1942)

Alun Lewis was born on 1 July 1915 at Cwmaman, a mining village near Aberdare; both his parents were schoolteachers and his father later became the town’s Director of Education. The family took summer holidays at Penbryn in Cardiganshire, one of the poet’s favourite places. He was educated at Cowbridge Grammar School, the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, where he read History, and at Manchester University. In 1938 he joined the staff of the Lewis Boys’ School, Pengam, enjoying a reputation as a gifted teacher, but in 1940, despite his pacifist convictions, resigned from the post and joined the Army as a commissioned officer. He found the life of the officers’ mess uncongenial, preferring the company of his men, most of whom were from the valleys of South Wales, but had time to resume the writing of poems and stories which he had begun while at school. In July 1941 he married Gweno Ellis, a teacher of German at Mountain Ash Grammar School. In the autumn of the following year his battalion of the South Wales Borderers was sent to India, where another period of intense literary activity began. The poverty and nihilism of India affected him deeply and he began to suffer bouts of the depression that had dogged him for several years. In January 1944 he went with his regiment to Chittagong in Burma. There, although an Intelligence Officer, he was given permission to move into a forward position facing the Japanese. On 5 March 1944 he was found shot in the head near the officers’ latrines; he died of his wounds six hours later. An Army court of inquiry concluded that his death was an accident, though the belief has persisted that he had taken his own life. Despite his comparatively small output – he published only ninety-four poems and twenty-five stories – Alun Lewis was recognized as an accomplished writer during his own short lifetime. Serious, idealistic, devoted to those he loved, particularly his wife, and intent on serving humanity as a writer, he was primarily concerned with what he called ‘the twin themes of life and death’, exploring them in verse and prose of a high order. His stories appeared in The Last Inspection (1943) and the posthumous volume In the Green Tree. His two collections of poems are Raiders’ Dawn (1942) and Ha! Ha! Among the Trumpets(1945); his Collected Poems (ed. Cary Archard) appeared in 1994 and a selection in the Corgi series in 2003. In everything he wrote there is compassion for the underdog, whether British soldier or Indian peasant, and a fine delight in the natural world, even in the parched landscapes of the sub-continent. His was a tragic vision, forced to early maturity by his military experience, and his death at the age of 28 was undoubtedly the single greatest loss sustained by Welsh letters during the Second World War.

You can download the story in PDF format here. (If download does not start, then right click the link and select 'Save link as'.)

Selected bibliography

In the Green Tree (Library of Wales, 2006)

Contributed to

Story I (anthology) (Library of Wales, 2014)

31 Stories in May at Hay!: Day 27 - 'Chickens' by Rachel Trezise

Every day throughout May, you will be able to visit the Library of Wales website to download your free story, drawn from Story, vols I and II - a collection boasting the finest Welsh short fiction ever written and featuring some of the most talented literary names from both past and present, including the legendary Dylan Thomas and the award-winning Rachel Trezise, as well as read all about the chosen author.

Day 27: 'Chickens' by Rachel Trezise

(Taken from Fresh Apples, 2005)

Born in 1978 in Cwmparc in the Rhondda valley, South Wales, where she still lives, Rachel Trezise is, in the recent words of Richard Lewis Davies, Parthian Books' "big success". While attending the University of Glamorgan in Wales and University of Limerick in Ireland, she conceived, wrote and published her first novel, the semi-autobiographical In and Out of the Goldfish Bowl, in 2000. It recieved critical acclaim, and led to a place on the Orange Futures List in 2001 and Harpers & Queen proclaiming her the 'new face of literature' in 2003.

Her second book, a short story collection called Fresh Apples followed in 2005 and won the inaugural Dylan Thomas Prize, one of the world's richest literary awards, in 2006. Shortly after, Trezise took up writer's residence at the University of Texas, before returning home to research, write and publish her third book, Dial M for Merthyr, which charts her experiences on tour with the Welsh band Midasuno. Following two other releases with different publishers - Loose Connections (Accent Press, 2010) and Sixteen Shades of Crazy(Blue Door, 2010) - Trezise returned to Parthian in 2013 with her second collection: Cosmic Latte. Her work has been translated into several languages and has been published in Australia and New Zealand, Denmark and Italy.

She has also written for the stage and radio, with her first venture into theatre, 2007's I Sing of a Maiden, which featured interspersed performances by Charlotte Greig, playing to sell-out audiences across Wales. She also achieved success with her 2013 playTonypandymonium, which won the People’s Prize for Best Production (English language) at the Theatre Critics of Wales Awards. Her first radio play, Lemon Meringue Pie, was broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Afternoon Play slot in September 2008.

You can download the story in PDF format here. (If download does not start, then right click the link and select 'Save link as'.)

Selected bibliography

Cosmic Latte (Parthian, 2013)

Dial M for Merthyr (Parthian, 2007)

Fresh Apples (Parthian, 2005)

In and Out of the Goldfish Bowl (Parthian, 2000)

Plays and theatre

Tonypandymonium (2013)

Lemon Meringue Pie (2008)

I Sing Of A Maiden (2007)

Contributed to

Story II (Library of Wales, 2014)

Bit on the Side (Parthian, 2007)

Sideways Glances (Parthian, 2005)

Urban Welsh: New Welsh Fiction (Parthian, 2005)

31 Stories in May at Hay!: Day 26 - 'Fresh Apples' by Rachel Trezise

Every day throughout May, you will be able to visit the Library of Wales website to download your free story, drawn from Story, vols I and II - a collection boasting the finest Welsh short fiction ever written and featuring some of the most talented literary names from both past and present, including the legendary Dylan Thomas and the award-winning Rachel Trezise, as well as read all about the chosen author.

Day 26: 'Fresh Apples' by Rachel Trezise

(Taken from Fresh Apples, 2005)

Born in 1978 in Cwmparc in the Rhondda valley, South Wales, where she still lives, Rachel Trezise is, in the recent words of Richard Lewis Davies, Parthian Books' "big success". While attending the University of Glamorgan in Wales and University of Limerick in Ireland, she conceived, wrote and published her first novel, the semi-autobiographical In and Out of the Goldfish Bowl, in 2000. It recieved critical acclaim, and led to a place on the Orange Futures List in 2001 and Harpers & Queen proclaiming her the 'new face of literature' in 2003.

Her second book, a short story collection called Fresh Apples followed in 2005 and won the inaugural Dylan Thomas Prize, one of the world's richest literary awards, in 2006. Shortly after, Trezise took up writer's residence at the University of Texas, before returning home to research, write and publish her third book, Dial M for Merthyr, which charts her experiences on tour with the Welsh band Midasuno. Following two other releases with different publishers - Loose Connections (Accent Press, 2010) and Sixteen Shades of Crazy(Blue Door, 2010) - Trezise returned to Parthian in 2013 with her second collection: Cosmic Latte. Her work has been translated into several languages and has been published in Australia and New Zealand, Denmark and Italy.

She has also written for the stage and radio, with her first venture into theatre, 2007's I Sing of a Maiden, which featured interspersed performances by Charlotte Greig, playing to sell-out audiences across Wales. She also achieved success with her 2013 playTonypandymonium, which won the People’s Prize for Best Production (English language) at the Theatre Critics of Wales Awards. Her first radio play, Lemon Meringue Pie, was broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Afternoon Play slot in September 2008.

You can download the story in PDF format here. (If download does not start, then right click the link and select 'Save link as'.)

Selected bibliography

Cosmic Latte (Parthian, 2013)

Dial M for Merthyr (Parthian, 2007)

Fresh Apples (Parthian, 2005)

In and Out of the Goldfish Bowl (Parthian, 2000)

Plays and theatre

Tonypandymonium (2013)

Lemon Meringue Pie (2008)

I Sing Of A Maiden (2007)

Contributed to

Story II (Library of Wales, 2014)

Bit on the Side (Parthian, 2007)

Sideways Glances (Parthian, 2005)

Urban Welsh: New Welsh Fiction (Parthian, 2005)

31 Stories in May at Hay!: Day 25 - 'The Fare' by Lewis Davies

Every day throughout May, you will be able to visit the Library of Wales website to download your free story, drawn from Story, vols I and II - a collection boasting the finest Welsh short fiction ever written and featuring some of the most talented literary names from both past and present, including the legendary Dylan Thomas and the award-winning Rachel Trezise, as well as read all about the chosen author.

Day 25: 'The Fare' by Lewis Davies

(Taken from Love and Other Possibilities, 2008)

Born in 1967 in Penrhiwtyn, Lewis Davies is one of the founding partners of Parthian, as well as a successful author, poet, editor, playwright and essayist. The company was established in 1993 to publish his first novel Work, Sex and Rugby, and has now published over two hundred titles of which over 190 are still in print. Davies has been involved in the literary scene in Wales since 1990 and is the current commercial director of Parthian and the Library of Wales series.

Aside from Work, Sex and Rugby, which was a national winner in World Book Day's 'We Are What We Read' poll, his novels include Tree of Crows (1996) and My Piece of Happiness(1999), and he has also published a selection of literary essays - As I Was a Boy Fishing (2003) - and a critically acclaimed selection of stories Love and Other Possibilities(2008). His work has received numerous awards, including the Rhys Davies short story competition (for his 1999 short story 'Mr Roopratna's Chocolate') and the John Morgan writing award (for his 1997 travel book Freeways: a Journey West on Route 66). He has worked extensively in Welsh theatre and has had a number of plays professionally produced, including Sex and Power at the Beau Rivage (2003), a play about about the meeting of Rhys Davies and D. H. Lawrence in the French Mediterranean of Bandol, andFootball (2004). His work for younger readers includes Tai and the Tremorfa Troll, a series of children’s picture books available in both English and Welsh and developed with the illustrator Hayley Acreman.

You can download the story in PDF format here. (If download does not start, then right click the link and select 'Save link as'.)

Selected bibliography

Love and Other Possibilities (Parthian, 2008)

Football (Parthian, 2004)

As I Was a Boy Fishing: Selected Essays (Parthian, 2003)

My Piece of Happiness (Parthian, 1999)

Freeways: a Journey West on Route 66 (Parthian, 1997)

Tree of Crows (Parthian, 1996)

Work, Sex and Rugby (Parthian, 1993)