Abstract
‘This sea-town was my world’1 Dylan Thomas said of Swansea, and certainly the most arresting feature of Swansea is the wide and splendid curve of the shore, towards which the hills of Swansea descend. It was this spectacular view that greeted the poet from his home in Cwmdonkin Drive, high above Swansea Bay, a town and seascape that vividly encapsulate a microcosm of Welsh life, today as in the twenties and thirties. If you approach from the east, industry and the docks dominate the scene, the road backed on one side by gaunt hillsides dotted with the ruins of earlier industrial life, and on the other by harsh grassland and glimpses of sand and sea beyond the oil tanks and dockside buildings. Then quite suddenly the communal centre of Swansea begins. But our journey takes us along the coast road, facing Swansea town and where the trains once ran to the Mumbles, on our left the new Marina and high flats, then the grassy hillock leading to the long, sandy beach, once busily crowded with holidaymakers in summer. While to the right, we soon pass the town centre, Victoria Gardens, St Helens and the cricket ground, the lively fun-fair, Singleton Park and the University College.
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Notes
Dylan Thomas, ‘Reminiscences of Childhood’, Quite Early One Morning (London, 1954) p. 1.
Vernon Watkins, Collected Poems (Ipswich, 1986) p. 288.
Dylan Thomas, quoted by Geoffrey Moore in ‘Dylan Thomas’, Dylan Thomas: The Legend and the Poet, ed. E. W. Tedlock (London, 1960) p. 251.
Edward Thomas, The Life and Letters of Edward Thomas ed. John Moore (London, 1939) p. 156.
The Mabinogion trans. Gwyn Jones and T. Jones (London, 1949) pp. 63–4.
Dylan Thomas, The Collected Letters ed. Paul Ferris (London, 1985) p. 25.
Caitlin Thomas, Leftover Life to Kill (London, 1957) p. 56.
J. M. Brinnin, Dylan Thomas in America (London, 1956) p. 92.
Dylan Thomas, ‘The Fight’, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog (London, 1940) p. 77.
Dylan Thomas, ‘Three Nursery Rhymes’, Swansea Grammar School Magazine, vol. 27, no. 3 (December 1930) p. 82.
Dylan Thomas, ‘Modern Poetry’, Swansea Grammar School Magazine, vol. 26, no. 3 (December 1929) pp. 83–4.
Augustus John, ‘The Monogamous Bohemian’, Adam (Dylan Thomas Memorial Number), no. 238 (December 1953) p. 10.
Caitlin Thomas, with George Tremlett, Caitlin (London, 1986) p. 44.
Gwyn Jones, ‘Welsh Dylan’, Adelphi, vol. 30, no. 2 (February 1954) p. 115.
Dylan Thomas, ‘A Painter’s Studio’, Texas Quarterly vol. iv, no. 4 (Winter 1961) p. 56.
Vernon Watkins, ‘Introduction’ to Dylan Thomas: Letters to Vernon Watkins (London, 1957) pp. 12–13.
Nicolette Devas, Two Flamboyant Fathers (London, 1966) p. 198. I am here particularly indebted to her book for information.
Dylan Thomas, ‘Poetic Manifesto’ (1951), Dylan Thomas: Early Prose Writings, ed. Walford Davies (London, 1971) p. 154.
Dylan Thomas, ‘I Am Going to Read Aloud’, The London Magazine, vol. 3, no. 9 (September 1956) p. 16.
Dylan Thomas, ‘I Am Going to Read Aloud’, The London Magazine, vol. 3, no. 9 (September 1956) p. 15.
Dylan Thomas, ‘I am Going to Read Aloud’, The London Magazine, vol. 3, no. 9 (September 1956) p. 17.
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© 1991 John Ackerman
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Ackerman, J. (1991). Dylan Thomas’s Life. In: A Dylan Thomas Companion. Macmillan Literary Companions. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-13373-4_1
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