Alun Lewis (1915-1944) plaque, University of Aberystwyth. Photo by Stefanik, 2018. Licensed under Creative Commons, courtesy Wikimedia Commons.
Alun Lewis (1 July 1915 - 5 March 1944) was an Anglo-Welsh poet,[1] regarded by many as Britain's finest World War II poet.[2]
Life[]
Youth and education[]
Lewis, was born on at Cwmaman, near Aberdare in Cynon Valley in the South Wales Coalfield. His father and mother were school teachers at Llanwern; and he had a younger sister, Mair and 2 brothers.
By the time Alun won a scholarship to attend Cowbridge Grammar School, he was already interested in writing. He went on to study at Aberystwyth University and the University of Manchester.
Career[]
Lewis was unsuccessful as a journalist and instead earned his living as a supply teacher. He met poet Lynette Roberts (whose poem "Llanybri" is an invitation to him to visit her home), but she was married to another poet, Keidrych Rhys. In 1939, Lewis met Gweno Ellis, a teacher, whom he married on 5 July 1941.
After the outbreak of the Second World War Lewis joined the British army's Royal Engineers in the ranks because although a pacifist he wanted to help the defeat of fascism. However, he then inexplicably sought and gained a commission in an infantry battalion.
In 1941 he collaborated with artists John Petts and Brenda Chamberlain on the "Caseg broadsheets". His earliest published book was the poetry collection Raider's Dawn, and other poems (1942), which was followed up by a volume of short stories, The Last Inspection , in 1942.
In 1942 Lewis was sent to India with the South Wales Borderers.
Lewis died on 5 March 1944 in Burma, in the course of the campaign against the Japanese. He was found shot in the head, after shaving and washing, near the officers' latrines, with his revolver in his hand, and died from the wound 6 hours later. Despite its looking like a case of suicide, an army court of inquiry concluded that he had tripped and that the shooting was an accident.[3]
Writing[]
Although Lewis was born in South Wales, he wrote in English only.[4]
Lewis' poems about his war experiences have been described as showing "his brooding over his army experiences and trying to catch and hold some vision that would illuminate it's desolation with meaning" (see Ian Hamilton "Alun Lewis Selected Poetry and Prose) [5]
In his poem Raider's Dawn Lewis makes a biblical reference to Peter and Paul.
His 2nd book of poems, Ha! Ha! Among the Trumpets. Poems in Transit, was published in 1945, and his Letters from India in 1946. Several collections of his poems, letters and stories have been published subsequently.
All Day It Has Rained[]
;All Day it has Rained
All day it has rained, and we on the edge of the moors
Have sprawled in our bell-tents, moody and dull as boors,
Groundsheets and blankets spread on the muddy ground
And from the first grey wakening we have found
No refuge from the skirmishing fine rain
And the wind that made the canvas heave and flap
And the taut wet guy-ropes ravel out and snap,
All day the rain has glided, wave and mist and dream,
Drenching the gorse and heather, a gossamer stream
Too light to stir the acorns that suddenly
Snatched from their cups by the wild south-westerly
Pattered against the tent and our upturned dreaming faces.
And we stretched out, unbuttoning our braces,
Smoking a Woodbine, darning dirty socks,
Reading the Sunday papers – I saw a fox
And mentioned it in the note I scribbled home;
And we talked of girls and dropping bombs on Rome,
And thought of the quiet dead and the loud celebrities
Exhorting us to slaughter, and the herded refugees;
– Yet thought softly, morosely of them, and as indifferently
As of ourselves or those whom we
For years have loved, and will again
Tomorrow maybe love; but now it is the rain
Possesses us entirely, the twilight and the rain.
And I can remember nothing dearer or more to my heart
Than the children I watched in the woods on Saturday
Shaking down burning chestnuts for the schoolyard's merry play
Or the shaggy patient dog who followed me
By Sheet and Steep and up the wooded scree
To the Shoulder o' Mutton where Edward Thomas brooded long
On death and beauty – till a bullet stopped his song.
Publications[]
- Raiders' Dawn and other poems. London: Allen & Unwin, 1941.
- Ha! Ha! Among the Trumpets: Poems in transit (with foreword by Robert Graves). London: Allen & Unwin, 1945.
- Selected Poems (edited by Jeremy Hooker & Gweno Lewis). London & Boston: Unwin, 1981.
- Collected Poems(edited by Cary Archard). Bridgend, UK: Seren Books, 1994.
Novel[]
- Morlais. Bridgend, UK: Seren, 2015.
Short fiction[]
- The Last Inspection, and other stories. London: Allen & Unwin, 1942; New York: Macmillan, 1943.
- Collected Stories (edited by Cary Archard). Bridgend, UK: Seren Books, 1990.
Collected editions[]
- In the Green Tree (letters & stories) (edited by Gwyn Jones). London: Allen & Unwin, 1948.
- Selected Poetry and Prose (edited by Ian Hamilton). London: Allen & Unwin, 1966.
- Alun Lewis: A miscellany of his writings (edited by John Pikoulis). Bridgend, UK: Poetry Wales Press, 1982.
- Inwards Where All the battle Is: A selection of Alun Lewis ̕writings from India (edited by Jeremy Hooker; illustrated by David Gentleman). Newtown, Wales, UK: Gwasg Gregynog, 1997.
Letters[]
- Letters from India (edited by A.L. Rouse). Cardiff: Penmark Press, 1946.
- Letters to My Wife (edited by Gweno Lewis). Bridgend, UK: Seren Books: 1989.
- A Cypress Walk: Letters to 'Frieda' (with a memoir by Freda Aykroyd). London: Enitharmon Press, 2006.
Song, by Alun Lewis (read by Dylan Thomas)
Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.[6]
See also[]
'Destruction' by Alun Lewis and Lewis School Pengam
References[]
- John Pikoulis, Alun Lewis: A life. Bridgend, UK: Seren Books, 1991.
Fonds[]
- Alun Lewis papers at the National Library of Wales
Notes[]
- ↑ Britannica Online
- ↑ London Review
- ↑ "Alun Lewis". Channel4.com. Archived from the original on 21 December 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20071221152832/http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/S/soldier_poets/biog_lewis.html. Retrieved 2008-01-07.
- ↑ Britannica Online
- ↑ http://www.ianhamilton.org/writing/anthologies.html
- ↑ Search results = au:Alun Lewis, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Dec. 2, 2019.
External links[]
- Poems
- "To a Comrade in Arms"
- Alun Lewis at PoemHunter (2 poems)
- Alun Lewis at AllPoetry (4 poems)
- Audio /video
- Books
- Alun Lewis at Amazon.com
- About
- Alun Lewis at the Poetry Foundation
- Alun Lewis (1915-1944) at the War Poets Association
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