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› Volume
18, 2012
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›
Volume 5, December 2004
Archive:
›Volume
17, 2011
›Volume 16, 2011
›Volume 15, 2010
›Volume 14, 2010
›Volume 13, 2009
›Volume 12, 2009
›Volume 11, 2008
›Volume 10, 2008
›Volume 9, 2007
›Volume 8, 2007
›Volume 7, 2006
›Volume 6, 2005
›Volume 5, 2004
›Volume 4,
2001
›Volume 3, 2000
›Volume 2, 1999
›Volume 1, 1999
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Ruth Bidgood: A
Poet in the Heart of Wales |
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MATTHEW JARVIS |
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Abstract |
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| Born on 20 July 1922
in the south Wales mining village of Seven Sisters,
Glamorgan, Ruth Bidgood has been writing poetry since the
mid-1960s and is now one of Wales’s most significant poets.
Particularly associated with the mid-Wales area surrounding
the remote north Breconshire village of Abergwesyn – where
she lived for many years – Bidgood is known for her in-depth
poetic engagement with the stories, people and land of this
particular region. Whilst suggesting that Bidgood’s work is
notable for its easy conversational form, this article
argues that her poetry is substantially rooted in a striking
darkness of perspective and that there is a persistent
brutality to aspects of that mid-Wales work which is the
core of her poetic output. However, the analysis offered
here also contends that a significant vein of celebration
runs counter to such darkness. The article thus concludes by
proposing that Bidgood’s oeuvre offers up a richly nuanced
and varied picture of the mid-Wales region that she has made
her home.
Keywords:
Ruth Bidgood;
contemporary English-Language poets of Wales; historical
memory; poetry and local history; poetry and topography;
Roland Mathias Prize |
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