Three of the Best for Aber Alumni at the National Eisteddfod

Glenys Mair Roberts, winner of the Crown at the National Eisteddfod

The three main literary prizes at the Blaenau Gwent and Heads of the Valleys National Eisteddfod at Ebbw Vale this year were deservedly won by former students of Aberystwyth University, to national acclaim.

Glenys Mair Glyn Roberts from Llantrisant was crowned on Monday 2 August for her series of poems on the subject ‘Change’.

Having studied Welsh, English and History at Ysgol Gyfun Llangefni, Glenys attended the university at Aberystwyth, where she was awarded a first class honours degree in Welsh, and then an MA degree for her work on Celtic Mythology in twentieth century literature. Following a period as a teacher in Tonyrefail, she worked for some years for the Welsh Joint Education Committee in Cardiff before becoming a freelance translator. She has worked as a self-employed translator and editor for almost twenty years and is a member of the Association of Welsh Translators’ examining board.

Reading and interpreting poetry has been one of her main interests for many years, but it is only relatively recently that she started writing herself. This is her first attempt at winning the National Eisteddfod Crown.

The winning work is a collection of poems dealing with change in a number of ways, but the main theme is that life’s basic patterns – birth, growth, maturity, decay and death – never change – a feeling of change never changes as it were. However, there is an essence in life which provides a meaning for these patterns.

On Wednesday, 4 August, Dr Jerry Hunter from Penygroes, Gwynedd, but originally from Cincinnati, Ohio became the first ever American to win a major literary prize at the National Eisteddfod, when his novel ‘Adfywiad’, discussing the effects of war and Post Traumatic Stress, was awarded the Prose Medal. 

Jerry is a Reader in the Welsh Department at Bangor University, but during the 1980s studied for an MPhil at Aberystwyth, during which time he also played in the Welsh funk band Arfer Anfad. He has published four academic books, and one of them - Llwch Cenhedloedd - won the Welsh Book of the Year Award in 2004. He has also published a short novel for children, Ceffylau'r Cymylau and has presented history programmes on S4C.

The winning volume is based on the medieval Welsh tale of Myrddin Wyllt who became mad during the Battle of Arfderydd, who would not speak to anybody but his sister, Gwenddydd. The story has been updated and set in the context of the Second World War.

Tudur Hallam from Foelgastell, Carmarthenshire was presented with the Eisteddfod Chair on Friday 6 August for his poem in cynghanedd (strict metrical alliteration) on the subject ‘Gaining Ground’.

Tudur is a senior lecturer in Welsh at Academi Hywel Teifi, Swansea University. He was brought up in Penybanc, Ammanford and attended Ysgol Maes yr Yrfa. While a student at Aberystwyth University he twice won the Chair at the Inter-collegic Eisteddfod. The late Hywel Teifi Edwards, a Fellow of Aberystwyth University, urged Tudur to win the chair for the Department that he led in Swansea. This year, Tudur has obeyed his former professor’s wish, and the winning work is an attempt to remember him and to appreciate the relevance of his life and vision to Wales today.

This is not a traditional commemorative work, but rather a story about an old man on New Year’s Day, who is too ready to criticise young people and too slow to motivate them.  Some may have the view that the old man represents the passive, suspicious, hopeless, whingeing Welsh speaker. The message in the poem is that he must, if he wants to see the language thrive, change his way of life, by following the example of the hands-on leader, Professor Hywel Teifi Edwards.

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