The Sub-Substack Series: Wales Unveiled

Dyma Gymru o'r Unol Daleithiau!

Photo by Charlie Seaman on Unsplash

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Talking about Wales presents people with a challenge, whether it’s tied up with the Welsh language (“too many consonants!” I hear people scream as they run away with their hands over their ears), Welsh music (“Oh, aren’t those beautiful lucifers and angelic voices I hear from the Bannau Brycheiniog?”) and of course, this nifty piece:

My hat-in-the-ring will be showcasing a culture that is both proud and quiet. From authors to music, actors to books. It’ll be an ongoing series where I hope to learn as much about Cymru (‘Wales’) as you.

In the meantime, if you’d like a taste of what the Welsh have to offer here on Substack, please subscribe to

Cwlwm

(‘knot’).

As for the above image, this is the Wales Millenium Centre in Cardiff. Opened in 2004, the carved inscription on the front was written by Wales’ National Poet, Gwyneth Lewis MBE, and with each six-foot tall letter made of stained glass and set in glass-reinforced gypsum she said: “I find it quite shocking to see them so large.”

Each of the letters of the inscription is a window of its own, opening up the theatre foyers for people looking in, and looking out. And what is the bilingual poem? “In these stones horizons sing” is the English part. Not just a translation, the Welsh part says: “Creu Gwir fel Gwydr o Ffwrnais Awen” which means: ‘Creating truth like glass from inspiration’s furnace.’

Ms Lewis said: “I wrote the words to reflect the cultural ambition of the Centre. They draw both on Wales’s industrial past and the institution’s location in Cardiff Bay, once the greatest coal port in the world.”

Felly (‘So’)… having said all that, the focus will be on the creative arts within Wales and since I’m musically inclined, you’ll see a broad range of styles covered here, whether it’s The Alarm, Young Marble Giants, 60 Ft. Dolls, Manic Street Preachers, Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, Catatonia or Catfish and the Bottlemen.

“What It Is, Is”