Writers and researchers win 2025 Saunders Lewis Memorial Fund scholarships

The trustees of the Saunders Lewis Memorial Fund have announced the winners of this year’s scholarships, all working in diverse fields on unique pieces.

The Memorial Fund was established in 1989 in honour of Saunders Lewis, a founding member of Plaid Cymru and one of the “the greatest figures in Welsh literature of the twentieth century.”

A sequel to a successful book, a comparison between land ownership in Wales and Poland and a study of the well-known figure Myrddin Llydaw are the areas covered and the successful trio are Iestyn Tyne, Rhianwen Daniel and David Callander.

The fund’s scholarship is offered every two years and successful applicants have the opportunity to spend time in Europe studying drama and/or film, political systems, and the literary connections of the fine arts including music. They may also submit a study relating to Saunders Lewis’ contribution to Welsh literature, theatre or politics.

Hopes

Following the publication of his non-fiction-creative book ‘Y Cyfan a fu Rhyngom Ni’, Iestyn Tyne intends to write a sequel that traces the story of Morris T Williams of whom we hear at the end of the first volume.

Iestyn explained: “At the end of Y Cyfan a Fu Rhyngom Ni, we hear about Morris T. Williams – who was in a relationship with Prosser Rhys in Caernarfon between 1920 and 1921 – and his departure from Wales, following the shattering of his hopes of the love affair and the death of his father. I had always considered the first volume to be part of a wider project, and responses received since its publication have confirmed that there is a demand to hear more about, and by, Morris.

“This scholarship makes it possible for me to spend time researching his history and have time in Paris with the intention of publishing a second volume chronicling Morris’s history in the next two years.”

Rhianwen Daniel goes in a very different direction as she explains: “The purpose of this project is to explore the current relevance of Saunders Lewis’ political ideology around ‘ownership’, namely the importance of the prosperity of local small and medium-sized farms for maintaining patriotism and preserving cultural heritage.

“My intention is to make a comparative study between Wales and Poland – a Catholic country where family farming has also been so important to life and ‘folk’ culture and national identity. But it now faces increasing threats as the farming industry is increasingly mechanised and replaced by impersonal multinational companies with no local responsibilities.

“I’m extremely grateful for this financial support which means I can spend time in Poland studying in more depth the elements that affect the countryside there and compare that with what’s happening here in Wales.”

Political figures

Myrddin Llydaw is among those few figures who ventured from the Brythonic civilisation to gain worldwide fame and is a figure of relevance to the work of Saunders Lewis according to David Callander.

David said: “Myrddin has always been a political figure, central to the prophetic tradition and the concept of sons of prophecy. This project will be an opportunity to compare how it has been used and is still used today in Brittany. This in turn has the potential to shed new light on the use made of the Merlin figure in Wales.

“The literature of Brittany is rich in references to Myrddin, and this scholarship means that I will have the opportunity to visit the two main centres for Breton Studies at the Universities of Rennes and Brest and it is planned to divide my time between these two institutions.”

According to the chair of the Fund’s Board, Professor M Wynn Thomas, the applications received this year were of an extremely high standard and it was difficult to decide on the awards.

Professor Wynn Thomas commented: “The fund was originally set up to offer opportunities for mainly young people to research areas of interest to Saunders himself. This has enabled young Welsh people to spend some time in Europe in order to see what significance could be for Wales in the European context – contemporary or historical – in these areas.

“The entries this year were not only of an extremely high standard, but extremely diverse, as can be seen from those who came out on top. I am very much looking forward to seeing these come to fruition in the coming years and I am confident that they will make an important contribution to the literary world here in Wales.”