Book extract: Nightshade Mother by Gwyneth Lewis

We are pleased to publish an extract from Gwyneth Lewis’ memoir ‘Nightshade Mother’ described as ‘a book about the power of art, language and, ultimately, about homecoming after a lifetime of exile from herself. It is a profoundly moving and beautiful work; questing, forgiving and loving in its approach.’

Gwyneth Lewis

Friday, 2 March 1973 is my first eisteddfod day at Rhydfelen and my industriousness over Christmas bears fruit. I’m embarrassed now to read of my entry:

Mi ennilles i’r unawd piano, 1af, 2ail a 3ydd yn y barddoniaeth Saesneg. Cydradd gyntaf mewn un adrodd, ac ail yn yllall, 3ydd yn y cerdd dant (nid wy’n cofio rhagor)

… Mi GES I’R GADAIR A’R CWPAN PENCAMPWR.

 (I won the piano solo, 1st, 2nd and 3rd in the English poetry. Joint first in one recitation, second in the other, 3rd in the cerdd dant10 (I don’t remember more) … I HAD THE CHAIR AND THE CHAMPION’S CUP.)

(2 March 1973)

Trophy

The lower school champion’s cup is a huge silver trophy which I have difficulty dragging home on the school bus. But, I win alot of points for my house, Dinefwr, which carries the day. I hate the sound of my own name being announced:‘GWYNETH LEWIS!’ is a creature I don’t want to be. Others, who aren’t receiving their dues in the written competitions because ‘GWYNETH LEWIS!’ is so dominant, are understandably frustrated. Pupils are kind when they could have been mean.As I go for my lunch, voices call out congratulations and I smile modestly – no, I grimace – which gives me a name for not being a bighead.

The only competition among these that pleases me is the Chair, which is a big deal for a poet. With the Crown, it’s one of the two major prizes in the poetry world, dating back to early medieval poetry competitions, when bards were apprenticed to masters in order to gain a licence to be court poets.

Reinvented in the eighteenth century, each St David’s Day school eisteddfod (or ‘sitting’) mimics the convocation of poets who decide on those worthy to be a Prifardd (‘Chief Bard’). My feelings are hopelessly mixed. I want to be a poet, but this way of doing it is tainted. Eryl has pushed me to compete too much and is also‘editing’ my work to a degree that makes me uncomfortable.

Mortified

In 1973, I’m mortified by an essay that appears under my name in the school magazine, Na N’og, which collects the ‘best’writing from the whole school. The piece is entitled ‘Rhwng Gwyll a Gwawr’ (‘Between Dusk and Dawn’) and is about my not being able to fall asleep the instant my head hits the pillow. I trace the impressions of the day but then comes a sentence which made me squirm then and now:

Yn araf iawn, fe ddaw pethau mwy dychmygol i’m meddwl. Efallai, os gweithiaf yn galed, mi allaf ennill pob cystadleuaeth yn y mabolgampau a dod yn arwres yr holl ysgol …

 (Very gradually, more imaginary things come to my mind. Perhaps, if I work hard, I can win every competition in the sports and become heroine for the whole school.)

I’m not athletic. I’m a good swimmer but I don’t compete because it makes me too nervous. Team sports, throwing things and running make no sense to me. However, Eryl and my sister were both athletic. I now wonder if Eryl was fantasising one omnicompetent, composite daughter, an amalgam of us three. When, rightly, I’m teased for that sentence on the bus, I can say nothing in my own defence without implicating my mother, which I can’t do, out of loyalty. Stay silent and I’m presenting a sham self to the world – what’s more, one I don’t like. The double bind makes me hot with shame.

—What did Eryl want from me?

—Herself.

Success

Ironically, during my teen years, Eryl was making her own way as a writer and experiencing success. She begins to write short stories for children and adults. BBC television and radio producers clearly like her work and she’s in demand:

Yn y prynhawn, fe aeth Mam i weld Evelyn Williams, ac fe gaethon nhw chat hir. Mae Miss Williams am i Mamdrosi unrhyw stori neu lyfr Saesneg i’r Gymraeg.

 Y mae Bernard Evans wedi derbyn y stori i ‘Dywedwch chi’, ac yn y nos, fe ffoniodd rhyw ddyn i ofyn i Mam i ysgrifennu stori arall.

 (In the afternoon, Mam went to see Evelyn Williams and they had a long chat. Miss Williams wants Mam to translate any story or book in English into Welsh. Bernard Evans has accepted the story for ‘You say’, and in the night, some man phoned to ask Mam to write another story.)

(2 February 1972)

In 1975, she begins to compete in local eisteddfodau in her own right:

Fe en[n]illodd Mam y delyneg a chael yr ail wobr am stori fer yn Nhreganna! Great! … Fe enillodd Mam yr ail am y gadair … – ail! Rwy’n chuffed.

 (Mam won the lyric and had second prize for a short story in Treganna! Great! … Mam won second for the chair … – second! I’m chuffed.)

(23–4 February 1975)

I’m genuinely thrilled with her success, but this isn’t entirely an un- selfish emotion. A happy Eryl takes the pressure off me. On 2 April, ‘Fe ysgrifennodd Mam delyneg a soned – mae’n nhw’n dda’ (‘Mam wrote a lyric and a sonnet – they’re good’). In April thatyear, at the Eisteddfod y Fro (‘the Regional Eisteddfod’) at Barry College, I win fifty pence for recitation and Eryl wins ‘lots’ of literary prizes. I hang outside the hall for a lot of the time with a gang of friends from school ‘yn chwerthin tan ein bod ni’n sâl ’(‘laughing till we were sick’).

—That’s more like it. Eryl inside, winning, you outside the hall, having fun.

 That year, I enjoy ‘a good Christmas’, as my parents give me a typewriter, the best present ever. My sister gives me a pair of false eyelashes which I love, though I can’t do them justice.

Nightshade Mother is published by Calon and is available from all good bookshops.