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School of Welsh

Harvard Professor visits Bangor’s School of Welsh

Professor Patrick Ford from Harvard University’s Department of Celtic Languages and Literatures recently visited Bangor University’s School of Welsh in order to present to the University a unique copy of Gwaith Dafydd ap Gwilym.

Edited by Sir Thomas Parry, Gwaith Dafydd ap Gwilym is the authoritative printed edition of the poems composed by the premier medieval and was hailed as a milestone in Welsh scholarship when it first appeared in the 1950s.  Thomas Parry is a former Professor and Head of Welsh at Bangor and when Pat Ford was learning Welsh in the 1960s, the editor presented him with a copy of his magnum opus while apologising for the ‘scribbles’ in it.  The ‘scribbles’ turned out to be pencil notes by the editor himself as he prepared a new edition of the volume!

Left to right: Dr Jason Walford Davies, Dr Jerry Hunter, Prof. Patrick Ford from Harvard University, Mr Einion Thomas, Emeritus Prof. Gwyn Thomas, Prof. Gerwyn Wiliams

Left to right: Dr Jason Walford Davies, Dr Jerry Hunter, Prof. Patrick Ford from Harvard University, Mr Einion Thomas, Emeritus Prof. Gwyn Thomas, Prof. Gerwyn Wiliams

During the meeting Pat Ford presented this unique copy to Einion Thomas, Bangor University’s Archivist, and Emeritus Professor Gwyn Thomas, who has himself translated Dafydd ap Gwilym’s poems into English, provided a more personal profile of Thomas Parry.

The evening was hosted by Dr Jerry Hunter, a former student of Pat Ford at Harvard University who is now a Reader in Bangor’s School of Welsh, and also present was Sam Jones, a research student at Harvard who has spent the last semester at Bangor as part of the exchange scheme which operates between both institutions.