Hedd Wyn

Statue of Hedd Wyn in Trawsfynydd, Gwynedd, Wales

Hedd Wyn (born January 13, 1887 in Trawsfynydd , Meirionnydd (Merionethshire), Wales , † July 31, 1917 in Hagenbos near Ypres , Belgium ) was a Welsh farmer and Cymrian- speaking poet during the First World War . Hedd Wyn, whose real name is Ellis Humphrey Evans , was known by his bard name, which means "white peace" in the Cymrian language.

life and work

Hedd Wyn, the oldest of Evan and Mary Evans' eleven children, spent most of his life on the Yr Ysgwrn mountain farm a few miles east of Trawsfynydd. Hedd Wyn, who left school at fourteen, had been writing poetry in Kymrian since he was eleven. His talent was discovered and nurtured by Dyfnallt , who later co-founded Plaid Cymru , the Party of Wales.

Since he was 19, Hedd Wyn regularly took part in the poetry competitions of the Eisteddfodau - in 1907 he won his first bard chair (cadair) in Bala with the poem Y Dyffryn (The Valley). At the age of 23, at the suggestion of the poet Brifdyr , Ellis Evans took his bard name Hedd Wyn , which is said to recall the morning mood in the valleys of Meirionnydd when the first rays of sun break through the mist.

After three further successes in regional Eisteddfodau (1913 in Pwllheli with the Ode Canoldydd (The Midday), 1915 in Pontardawe with Cyfrinach Duw (The Secret of God) and in Llanuwchllyn with the poem Myfi Yw (I am)) Hedd Wyn took part in 1915 the Ode Eryri (Snowdon) for the first time at the national Eisteddfod (Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru). In the following year (1916) he achieved second place with the Ode Ystrad Fflur (Strata Florida) over the ruins of the medieval Cistercian monastery Strata Florida.

The war and the increasing casualties of the British Army became a major theme in Hedd Wyn's poetic work - his poems Plant Trawsfynydd (The Children of Trawsfynydd), Y Blotyn Du (The Black Spot), Nid â'n ango (Don't Forget) and especially Rhyfel (war) are among the most famous poems in Cymrian literature from the first half of the 20th century.

In the autumn of 1916, British authorities demanded that at least one of the Evans family sons should do military service - Ellis Evans volunteered to spare his younger brother Bob. From February 1917 he received basic military training in Litherland near Liverpool . Before being sent to the front in Flanders, Hedd Wyn received another seven weeks special leave in the spring of 1916 to help with the plowing - during this time he began working on his contribution to the national Eisteddfod in 1917.

In June 1917 Hedd Wyn and his unit - the 15th Battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers - were transferred to the front at Fléchin . There he completed his poem Yr Arwr (The Hero), which he sent to the Eisteddfod in Birkenhead , England , on July 15, 1917 under the pseudonym “Fleur de lis” after disputes with the military censorship .

The following day the unit was relocated in order to take part in the Third Battle of Flanders (Third Battle of Ypres, English: Battle of Passchendaele), which was enormously bloody and costly for the British troops in particular . The Royal Welch Fusiliers were deployed on the front lines and began the attack on Pilkem and Hagebos (near Langemark ) in the early morning hours of July 31, 1917 . Hedd Wyn was seriously wounded by the German artillery bombardment that started immediately and died that same day at around 11 a.m.

On September 6, 1917, at the Eisteddfod in Birkenhead, the bard chair was given to Fleur de lis in the presence of the Cymrian-speaking British Prime Minister David Lloyd George - to the surprise of those present, no one rose to take the bard chair. When it became known that Hedd Wyn had fallen six weeks earlier, the bard's chair was wrapped in black cloth and brought in horse-and-carriage procession to Yr Ysgwrn, which became a pilgrimage destination for Cymrian-speaking Welsh in the decades that followed.

Hedd Wyn's grave

Hedd Wyn was buried in the Artillery Wood military cemetery near Boezinge (field II, row F, grave 11) - at the request of his father, the tombstone bears the epitaph Y Prifardd Hedd Wyn (The Chief Bard Hedd Wyn).

reception

Hedd Wyn's collected works were published in 1918 under the title Cerddi'r Bugail (The Shepherd's Poems) (new editions 1931 and 1994). In 1923 a memorial was erected in his hometown of Trawsfynydd , in Trawsfynydd, Langemark and Ypres several memorial stones commemorate his life and work.

In 1992 the life of Hedd Wyn was filmed by Paul Turner under the name Hedd Wyn on behalf of the Kymrisch-language television station Sianel Pedwar Cymru (S4C) . It was first broadcast to mark the tenth anniversary of the start of S4C on November 1, 1992. Hedd Wyn is one of the most important films in the Cymrian language and in 1992 was the first ever Welsh film to be nominated for an Oscar for best foreign language film .

Web links

Commons : Hedd Wyn  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Headstone of Hedd Wyn
• Texts by Hedd Wyn in the Cymrian Wikisource ( Yr Arwr )
• Hedd Wyn in the Internet Movie Database (English)