Michael Sheen gives voice to powerful poem on Dic Penderyn

Michael Sheen has lent his voice to a poem, ‘The Execution of Richard Lewis’, by author and historian Sally Roberts Jones.

After forty years of research, Sally, who also acts as Vice President of the Neath Port Talbot Historical Society, released a book focused on Lewis’ life, Dic Penderyn: The Man and the Martyr, the first full biography of the iconic figure.

“The story of Dic Penderyn is quite remarkable,” Sally said. “He is much more of a hero than people realise. He tends to get a bit hidden behind some of the other people involved.

“But when you look at it, he was the man who was there going around encouraging unions and so on. When he was only 16, he lost his job for complaining about the lack of rights for his fellow workers.”

Dic Penderyn, though born and buried in Port Talbot, is most closely associated with Merthyr Tydfil. On 13th August 1831, the 23-year old miner was hung outside Cardiff Gaol as an example after the Merthyr Rising workers’ revolt.

Innocent of the crime he had been charged with, he was hailed a martyr of the budding labour movement, and still plays a large part in the Welsh cultural imagination.

Sally’s poem in Penderyn’s honour reads:

They brought him a cup of tea and a slice of bread, a thin slice.

Why waste any more on a dying man?

Their pious prayers, a suitable ending.

All done, the ritual over, the body got rid of, the newspapers silent again.

‘I’m dying for thousands,’ he said.

And so he was.

The appropriate victim to excuse that river of blood, but more than that, to silence the voices of hunger, hunger for freedom, for justice, to make sure that nothing would change.

Now his lordship rests easy at night, knows nothing of what they are dreaming, of the country their dreams will birth.

I’m dying for thousands, he said, and the thousands remember.

Sheen’s recitation, a “powerful piece of writing, performed by one of Wales’ most respected voices”, was uploaded to Facebook by Calon Films.

The independent film and TV production company are currently working on their debut feature, Iniquity, centred around the life and murder of Penderyn.

With “hiraeth at its core and social justice at its heart”, the Calon Films team hopes Iniquity will become one of the most culturally critical Welsh films ever made.

“We are not here to rewrite history. We are here to tell it properly,” Calon Films said. “Dic Penderyn’s story is not just history. it still lives in the people, the places and the voices of Wales today.

“Sally, one of the most knowledgeable local historians on Dic Penderyn, has been helping us ensure that the historical details are accurate and told respectfully.

“Hearing voices like hers reminds us why telling Welsh stories properly really matters.”

For more information about Iniquity and Calon Films, visit their site here. Sally’s biography of Dic Penderyn, Dic Penderyn: the Man and the Martyr, is available to purchase from Y Lolfa. More of her poetry can be found in the extensive collection, Notes for a Life: New and Selected Poems 1953-2005.