File NLW MS 24189E. - Saunders Lewis letters to T. Charles Edwards

Saunders Lewis, dramatist, poet, historian and literary critic, was born in Wallasey, Cheshire to a family of prominent Welsh Calvinistic Methodists. He was educated at a boys's school in Liscard and at Liverpool University, where he studied English and French. His academic career was interrupted by the First World War, in which Lewis served with the South Wales Borderers, but he quickly resumed his studies at the end of the conflict, and, having graduated, worked as librarian in Glamorgan before taking up a post as lecturer in the Welsh department of the University College of Swansea. In 1925, Lewis was one of the pioneering figures involved in establishing the National Party of Wales (later known as Plaid Cymru) and was made President of the fledgeling organisation the following year. Having written about the Roman Catholic church for a number of years, in 1932 Lewis converted to the faith also practised by his wife Margaret. In 1936, Lewis, D. J. Williams and Lewis Valentine set fire to the Royal Airforce's Bombing School in Penyberth on the Lleyn Peninsula, an event which has gone down in the annals of Welsh history and which earned Lewis imprisonment in Wormwood Scrubs and dismissal from his lecturing post in Swansea. He was eventually appointed senior lecturer in Welsh at the University of Cardiff but retired in 1957 to devote his time to writing. Lewis's litarary output is prodigious and he is considered by many to be the most important Welsh literary and political figure of the twentieth century; it is considered that his radio address for 1962, Tynged yr Iaith, was the direct instigating force behind the establishment of the Welsh language movement Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg.

David Jones (1895-1974) was an accomplished artist who produced watercolours, illustrations and inscriptions, and who also gained acclaim as a poet, especially as the author of In Parenthesis in 1937, and the long prose poem The Anathemata in 1952.
David Walter Jones was born in Brockley, Kent, on 1 November 1895. His mother, Alice Ann née Bradshaw, was from London, and his father, James Jones, was originally from Holywell, Flintshire. He attended the Camberwell School of Art from 1910-1914, and the Westminster School of Art from 1919-1921.
He joined the London Welsh Battalion of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers in 1915 and served as a private with them until 1918. This experience had a profound effect on him, and his first book, In Parenthesis (1937), is an epic war poem which deals with the period he spent in France.
In 1921 he was received into the Roman Catholic Church, adopting Michael as a middle name. This was a defining moment in his life and work. In the same year he met Eric Gill and joined Gill's community at Ditchling, Sussex, where he learnt wood-engraving. In 1924 he became engaged to Petra Gill and often visited the family at Capel y ffin, near Abergavenny. His engagement with Petra was broken off in 1927 and subsequently he never married.
Between 1928 and 1932 he moved around a great deal, producing watercolours and also writing. In 1933 he suffered a breakdown in health and endured repeated periods of ill-health from then onwards. He virtually stopped painting until 1937. In 1937 Faber published In Parenthesis, which T. S. Eliot regarded as 'a work of genius'. He was awarded the Hawthornden prize for it in 1938.
He was based at the parental home at Brockley until his mother's death in 1937. He then lived in Notting Hill, and from about 1946 lived in Harrow on the Hill. In 1970 he fell ill after breaking a bone in his hip and resided at Calvary Nursing Home, Harrow until his death in 1974.
A volume of essays Epoch and Artist was published by Faber in 1959, followed by The Fatigue (1965), The Tribune's Visitations (1969) and The Introduction to The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1972). The Sleeping Lord (1974) and The Roman Quarry (1981) were published posthumously.
In 1955 he was awarded the CBE, and also the Harriet Monroe memorial prize. In 1960 he was awarded the degree of D. Litt from The University of Wales and became both Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a member of the Royal Watercolour Society in 1961. He was awarded the Royal National Eisteddfod of Wales Gold medal in 1964 and the Welsh Arts Council Literature Prize in 1969.

Yr oedd Griffith John Williams (1892-1963) yn un o ysgolheigion ac athrawon Cymraeg mwyaf ei gyfnod.
Fe'i ganwyd yng Nghellan Court, sef Swyddfa Post Cellan, Ceredigion, 19 Gorffennaf 1892, yn fab i John ac Anne (neé Griffiths) Williams. Derbyniodd ei addysg gynnar yn ysgolion Cellan a Thregaron. Yn 1911, wedi derbyn Ysgoloriaeth Cynddelw, aeth i Goleg Prifysgol Cymru, Aberystwyth, gan raddio yn y Gymraeg yn 1914.
Rhwng 1914 ac 1915 bu'n athro yn ysgol sir Dolgellau, ac yna, rhwng 1915 ac 1916, yn ysgol sir y Porth, Rhondda. Yna dychwelodd i Aberystwyth i astudio testunau Cymraeg Canol, gan dderbyn gradd MA am ei draethawd 'The verbal forms in the Mabinogion and Bruts'. Yn y cyfamser, dechreuodd astudio llawysgrifau Llanover a roddwyd i'r Llyfrgell Genedlaethol yn 1917, a dechreuodd ymddiddori ym mywyd a gwaith Iolo Morganwg. Yn Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Castell-Nedd, 1918, enillodd ar y traethawd 'Beirdd Morgannwg hyd ddiwedd y ddeunawfed ganrif', ac yn 1919 cyhoeddodd erthyglau'n ymwneud â gwaith Iolo yn Y Beirniad. Yn sgîl hyn derbyniodd gymrodoriaeth gan Brifysgol Cymru i barhau gyda'i ymchwil yn y maes a, rhwng 1919 a 1920, bu'n gweithio dan oruchwyliaeth Syr John Morris-Jones. Yn 1921 derbyniodd y wobr yn Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Caernarfon am draethawd hir a manwl ar gysylltiad Iolo â'r un-ar-bymtheg o gywyddau a gynhwyswyd yn 'Y Chwanegiad' i Barddoniaeth Dafydd ab Gwilym (1789).
Bu'n cystadlu yn yr Eisteddfod Genedlaethol fel bardd hefyd. Enillodd yn Eisteddfod Corwen yn 1919 ar y tair telyneg, y soned, y darn barddonol i'w adrodd, ac ar gyfansoddi penillion telyn. Yn y Barri yn 1920 gwobrwywyd ei delyneg 'Gwladys Ddu' a'i soned 'Llanilltud Fawr'. Fodd bynnag, rhoes y gorau i farddoni wrth ymroi i ymchwilio i fywyd a gwaith Iolo a'i benodi yn 1921 yn ddarlithydd yn Adran y Gymraeg yng Ngholeg y Brifysgol, Caerdydd. Yn 1946 olynodd W. J. Gruffydd yng Nghadair y Gymraeg.
Ymhlith ei gyhoeddiadau ceir Gramadegau'r Penceirddiaid (1933), sef testun safonol o ramadeg y beirdd yn yr Oesoedd Canol gyda rhagymadrodd awdurdodol ar y ffynonellau llawysgrif ac ar addysg y beirdd. Gwnaeth hefyd astudiaeth drwyadl o waith ysgolheigion Cymraeg y Dadeni Dysg, a'i gampwaith yn y maes hwn oedd ei olygiad o Ramadeg Cymraeg Gruffydd Robert (1939). Gwnaeth hefyd gyfraniadau i lên a dysg yr ail ganrif-ar-bymtheg, y ddeunawfed a'r bedwaredd ganrif-ar-bymtheg, gan gynnwys astudiaethau safonol o waith Stephen Hughes, Charles Edwards, Edward Lhuyd, William Owen [-Pughe], ac eraill. Dangosodd le allweddol cymdeithasau Cymreig Llundain, yn enwedig y Cymmrodorion a'r Gwyneddigion, yn natblygiad llenyddiaeth Gymraeg y cyfnod diweddar. Serch hynny, mae'n sicr mai ar draddodiad llenyddol Morgannwg y cyflawnodd G. J. Williams ei waith llawnaf. Yn 1926, cyhoeddwyd traethawd buddugol 1921 o dan y teitl Iolo Morganwg a Chywyddau'r Ychwanegiad. Yn 1948 ymddangosodd Traddodiad Llenyddol Morgannwg, ac yn 1956, ar ôl astudio papurau ychwanegol a drosglwyddwyd i'r Llyfrgell Genedlaethol gan Iolo Aneirin Williams, ymddangosodd Iolo Morganwg: y gyfrol gyntaf.
Ar ôl ymddeol yn 1957 parhaodd i olygu'r cylchgrawn Llên Cymru, y bu ef yn bennaf gyfrifol am ei sefydlu yn 1950. Yn 1959 traddododd Ddarlith O'Donnell yng ngholegau Prifysgol Cymru ar y testun 'Edward 'Lhuyd'. Beirniadai yn yr Eisteddfod Genedlaethol, darlithiai i gymdeithasau lleol ac yn 1960 etholwyd ef yn llywydd cyntaf yr Academi Gymreig. Bu'n aelod o fwrdd golygyddol Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru a, rhwng 1959 ac 1961, yn gadeirydd Pwyllgor Amgueddfa Werin Sain Ffagan. Roedd hefyd yn gasglwr brwd ar hen lyfrau Cymraeg.
Priododd ag Elizabeth Elen Roberts, Blaenau Ffestiniog, yn 1922. Bu hi'n gyd-fyfyriwr ag ef yng Ngholeg Aberystwyth rhwng 1910 ac 1914. Bu'n athrawes y Gymraeg yn ysgol sir y merched, Trefforest, Pontypridd, 1914-1918, ac yn ysgol sir Glynebwy, Mynwy, 1918-1922.
Bu Elizabeth Williams yn gymorth mawr i'w gŵr yn ei waith ymchwil, ac ymddiddorai hithau, fel yntau, ym mywyd Cymru a'r iaith Gymraeg. Roedd y ddau yn rhan o'r criw bychan yn y dau-ddegau a sefydlodd y Mudiad Cenedlaethol a ddatblygodd wedyn yn Blaid Cymru.
Bu Griffith John Williams farw 10 Ionawr 1963, ac Elizabeth Williams, 31 Ionawr 1979.