Copyright by the Research into the English Literature and Language of Wales (CREW), University of Wales, Swansea, this is a long‐awaited reference work of cardinal importance. It is already accessible in its initial form online at www.bwlet.net. The book version “develops greatly” on the internet version. Extensive revisions are planned for the web site.
Welsh literature emerged c.600 CE and spans some 1,500 years of Welsh cultural history. Bibliography of Welsh Literature in English Translation (BWELT) offers a tool for “locating specific translations of specific items from this body of work according to the categories of author/text/genre and literary movement”. It thereby makes possible for the first time a comprehensive historical study of translation in a Welsh context. Belatedly, Wales has now come within the purview of modern translation studies.
S. Rhian Reynolds joins with Professor M. Wynn Thomas of CREW in an erudite Introduction (pp. ix‐xxviii), touching on the extensive socio‐political and cultural implications of any study of Welsh‐English translation. They brilliantly elucidate the historical background (from the thirteenth century onward), and discuss current, “tense controversy”. They are perceptive in assessment of Welsh English Translation in Theory and Practice (pp. xxiii‐xxv), contrasting the methods used by Rolfe Humphries, Joseph P. Clancy and Tony Conran. Reynolds modestly insists that her bibliography is “no more than an interim report – a ‘bwletin’ on work in progress – as there is undoubtedly a wealth of further material that awaits discovery”. True, but she has made immense progress.
Editorial Method (pp. xxix‐xxxiii) is essential preliminary reading, explaining the structure of the bibliography, which is set out chronologically with each period of Welsh history forming a separate section. Entries, then, are by author. There is an initial general bibliography (pp. xxxv‐xl) listing publications that include translations from Welsh literature through the ages. Full publication details are given. In the succeeding, chronological sections abbreviated titles are used. The main sections, in order, cover Early Welsh Poetry; The Poets of the Princes; Medieval Poetry; Medieval Prose; The Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries; The Eighteenth Century; The Nineteenth Century; The Twentieth Century; Contemporary Writing. Among the thousands of translations recorded are acknowledged classics of European culture: The Mabinogion, the poems of Dafydd ap Gwilym, the hymns of William Williams Pantcycelyn and the plays, fiction, and political writings of Sanders Lewis.
S. Rhian Williams merits respect and gratitude for a splendid achievement that will facilitate and promote greater understanding and enjoyment of Welsh‐language literature in the other nations of Great Britain, worldwide and (crucially) between the two cultures of Wales. Essential stock for all libraries at all levels throughout the British Isles, and for everyone anywhere with any affiliation with or interest in Welsh culture, Cymru and Cymry.
