The Writers of Wales Database

THOMAS, NED

Hafod Wen, Ffordd Caradog, Aberystwyth, SY23 2JY
Email:post@nedthomas.plus.com

A writer and literary critic in Welsh, English, and from time to time in other languages, Ned is also a cultural and social entrepreneur. After working as a journalist in London, he taught at the University of Salamanca in Spain and at Moscow State University in the days of the Soviet Union. While a member of the English Department at the University of Aberystwyth, Ned founded and edited the magazine Planet. Later he was Director of University of Wales Press and is currently President of the Mercator Institute at Aberystwyth University, a research centre running Europe-wide projects in the fields of language and literary translation. He is Chair of the company originally set up to publish the first-ever daily paper in Welsh, Y Byd, and which is now researching alternative ways of contributing to the variety of the Welsh-language press. As well as speaking about his own creative work which is mainly in Welsh, he is happy to speak on the writers of Wales, particularly R.S. Thomas and Waldo Williams, on Russian literature (Tolstoy, Pasternak), African and Caribbean writers in English (Walcott, Ngugi, Achebe) and on literary translation.

Selected Publications:
George Orwell (Oliver and Boyd)
The Welsh Extremist (Gollancz/ Y Lolfa)
Derek Walcott, Poet of the Islands/Bardd yr Ynysoedd (Welsh Arts Council)
Waldo Williams (Gwasg Pantycelyn)
Bydoedd - Cofiant Cyfnod (Y Lolfa)