Encyclopaedia

Contributors

The editors of the Welsh Academi Encyclopaedia of Wales, John Davies, Menna Baines, Nigel Jenkins and Peredur I. Lynch, called on the expert advice of nearly 400 contributors during the project.  Together, they are responsible for the 5,000 entries and more that cover every aspect of Wales’s past, people, places, arts, industry, environment and traditions.  From Snowdonia to the pampas of Patagonia, from folk heroes to Welsh Olympians, and the men and women of Wales who have excelled in art, culture and politics.

Academi is running a series of lectures based on the Encyclopaedia, given by some of the contributors themselves.  Between now and 31st March 2008 we can offer financial support to groups seeking to organise lectures either about the Encyclopaedia project as a whole or on any of the thousands of individual articles which comprise the work.  Please see the Online Order Form in this section for more details.  Below is a list of those contributors who are available to lecture:                             
 
Welsh

Menna Baines
Menna was born in Bangor but spent a great deal of her childhood in Llanerfyl, Montgomeryshire, before moving to Pen–y-groes in Arfon.  Soon after graduating in Welsh and completing an Mphil course at Bangor University, she worked in the journalistic field for some years – as arts sub-editor for Golwg to begin with (1988-91) and then as the editor of Barn (1991-6).  From 1996 she worked independently writing, scripting and editing.  She published two volumes, Pum Awdur Cyfoes: Cyflwyniad i Fyfyrwyr Ail Iaith (1997) and Yng Ngolau’r Lleuad: Ffaith a Dychymyg yng Ngwaith Caradog Prichard (2005), the latter reaching the longlist for the Academi Book of the Year 2006 Award.
 
Hywel Teifi Edwards
He was a Welsh literature tutor in the Department of Adult Education, University of Wales, Swansea and a Welsh Teacher there.  He has a special interest in the culture of Wales in the Victorian times and in the history of the National Eisteddfod as a key to that culture.
Subjects: 1. The National Eisteddfod 2. Ceiriog 3. Eos Morlais

Peredur I. Lynch
Professor Peredur I. Lynch is a native of Carrog in the old county of Merionethshire.  After graduating in Welsh at Bangor, he was employed between 1985 and 1990 as a Research Fellow at the Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies, Aberystwyth.  He was then appointed to a lectureship in the Department of Welsh at the University of Wales, Swansea and returned to Bangor as a lecturer in 1995.  He was awarded a Chair in 2005 and served as Head of the Welsh Department between 2003 and 2006.  He is an expert on the Poets of the Welsh Princes and made a major contribution to Cyfres Beirdd y Tywysogion (‘The Poets of the Princes series’) (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1991-96), the groundbreaking critical edition of their poetry.  He has published widely on many aspects of Welsh literature over the centuries.

Harri Pritchard Jones
Author and ex-psychiatrist.  He has published fifteen volumes: novels, collections of short stories, translations and literary criticism.  His work has been translated into seven languages, and broadcasted on Radio Cymru, Radio Wales, Radio 4 and 3, and Radio Denmark.  He has also written many television scripts.  He won awards with Barn, the National Eisteddfod and the Arts Council of Wales.  He lives in Cardiff, and is joint-chair of the Welsh Academy.
Subjects: 1. Wales and Ireland 2. Kate Roberts 3. Caradog Prichard 4. Saunders Lewis 5. Kate Roberts, Saunders Lewis and Caradog Prichard

Iwan Llwyd
Poet and journalist.  Born in Llanidloes, Powys.  Educated at Friars School, Bangor and University College of Wales, Aberystwyth.  The subject of his MA dissertation was Noddwyr y Beirdd yn Sir Gaernarfon (Those who sponsored the poets in Carnarvon County).  Winner of the Crown at the National Eisteddfod of Cwm Rhymni 1990 for his collection, Gwreichion.  He has published many volumes of poetry, and has written for the television and theatre.  He is a member of the bands Steve Eaves, Rhai Pobol and Geraint Løvgreen a’r Enw Da.  He has regular columns in Barddas and Barn.
Subjects: Poets and those who sponsored poets in Carnarvon County 1350-1650, specialising in the families Cochwillan, Glynllifon and Eifionydd.

English

Patrick Dobbs
Itinerant farmworker in England and Ireland, Agricultural Graduate, Nomad of the Americas, Agricultural journalist, Anthologised essayist, Writer of stories and scripts for radio, Published study of violence in rural Ulster, Colt-breaker and horse dealer, Sheep and cattle grazier, Close ties with rural Switzerland, Tenuous links with Guyana, Sheepdog trialling enthusiast.
Suggested Topics: 1. The farming of Wales, past and/or present and/or future. 2. Any other topic relevant to experience.

Neil Evans
Grew up in Senghenydd, was a student in Swansea and has lived in Harlech for over 30 years.  He worked in adult and higher education and has done research on many aspects of modern Welsh history, especially ethnic minorities, women’s history, politics, protest and the develpment of Welsh history as a subject.  Joint editor of Llafur.
Suggested Topics: 1. Ethnic Diversity in Wales  2. Most aspects of modern Welsh history  3. Development of Welsh Historical Writing.

Nigel Jenkins
Nigel was born on a farm in Gower and worked as a newspaper reporter in the English Midlands before returning home to work as a freelance writer and lecturer.  His latest book of poems is Hotel Gwales (Gomer, 2006); his book about Welsh missionaries in north-east India, Gwalia in Khasia (Gomer, 1995), won the Wales Book of the Year award in 1996.  His selected essays and articles, Footsore on the Frontier (Gomer Press), was published in 2001.  A new collection of haiku, O For a Gun, is due in June 2007 from Planet Books.  He is currently working on Real Swansea for Seren Books. He teaches creative writing at the University of Wales Swansea.

Peter Stead

M. Wynn Thomas
English teacher, Swansea University, and Director of CREW (Centre for Research into the English Literature and Language of Wales).  Author of twenty volumes on the literature of Wales, and on the literature of America.  Fellow of the British Academy, the English Society, and the Welsh Academy.  Current Chair of the Welsh Books Council.
Subjects: 1. War of Words: the preacher and the writer in Welsh Writing in English 2. R.S. Thomas and Borges

Meic Stephens
b.1938, Trefforest, Pontypridd. Ed.; UCW Aberystwyth, UCNW Bangor and University of Rennes; French teacher, Ebbw Vale 1962-66; Journalist with Western Mail 1966-67; Literature Director, Welsh Arts Council, 1967-90; Visiting Professor, Brigham Young University, Utah 1992-3; Lecturer in Creative Writing, University of Glamorgan 1994-2000; Professor of Welsh Writing in English, University of Glamorgan 2000-2003 (now Emeritus).  Founder and first editor of Poetry Wales 1965-73. Secretary, The Rhys Davies Trust. Has edited, translated and written about 160 books, notably The New Companion to the Literature of Wales.  Writes obituaries of eminent Welsh people for The Independent.
Suggested Topics: 1. Richard Llewellyn, Caradoc Evans, Idris Davies, Rhys Davies, Glyn Jones, Harri Webb, Leslie Norris; new anthology in the Library of Wales  2. The writing of obituaries.

Mike G. Bassett
Professor Michael Bassett is Head of the Department of Geology at the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff, and an Honorary Professor in the Department of Earth, Ocean and Planet Sciences at Cardiff University.  He is a specialist in the study of various fossil groups from the Cambrian, Ordovician and Silurian Periods (540 million to 400 million years ago).  Rocks of this age occupy much of Wales, and comparative studies with many other regions allow reconstructions to be made of ancient geographies, including the origin of Wales deep in the Southern Hemisphere.
Suggested Topics: 1. Moving continents - the journey of Wales through time 2. The restless landscape - rocks, fossils and processes that have shaped our country  3. Wales - the cradle of early geological studies.

Herbert Williams
Herbert Williams is an award-winning writer of poetry, novels, short stories and history.  He was awarded a Hawthornden Poetry Fellowship in 1992 and is a Fellow of The Welsh Academy.  His works include biographies of the Victorian entrepreneur and philanthropist David Davies and of the novelist and essayist John Cowper Powys.
Suggested Topics: 1. The Truth About Stage Coaches 2. The Railway Revolution 3. Top Sawyer to Top Cat: The Incredible David Davies 4. Wales v TB:  A Fight to the Finish 5. The Great Escape from Camp 198 6. John Cowper Powys: a Neglected Genius

Osi Rhys Osmond
Lives in Llansteffan.  From 1959 – 65 studied painting at Newport and Cardiff Colleges of Art. Exhibits widely in Britain and abroad, travels extensively as an artist and writer.  Contributed to the volume Imagining the Imagination the Word and the Visual Image (Gomer 2005) author of a monograph on the Polish painter Joseph Herman, (The Institute of Welsh Affairs 2006).  Broadcasts on Television and Radio, recently completed series on painting in Wales.
Suggested Topics: Welsh visual culture, arts and artists, design and craft and possibly some of the more esoteric areas of spontaneous cultural production including graffiti, garden design, signage, architecture, sheds and street fashion.

Below is a list of the other contributors: