Siân James (20 September 1930 – 21 July 2021)[1] was a Welsh novelist, academic and translator, who wrote in English. Her third novel, A Small Country, is seen as a classic of Anglo-Welsh literature. Her 1996 short-story collection Not Singing Exactly won the English-language category in Wales Book of the Year,[1] the first book by a woman to do so.

Birth and academic posts

James, born in Coed-y-bryn in Ceredigion, attended the University of Wales, Aberystwyth. She was a Fellow of the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, and of the Welsh Academy. She taught on the University of Glamorgan's Masters' degree in Creative Writing.[1] She was later awarded an honorary doctorate by the university for her contribution to literature in Wales.[1]

Writing career

Siân James twice won the Yorkshire Post Prize, for her first and second novels One Afternoon and Yesterday. One Afternoon was republished in 2023.[2] Her third novel A Small Country, has come to be regarded as a classic of Anglo-Welsh literature.[3][4] In 2006, A Small Country was adapted as a Welsh-language TV series, Calon Gaeth, which won the 2007 Bafta Cymru award for Best Drama/Drama Serial for Television.[5]

James translated Kate Roberts's novel Y Byw Sy'n Cysgu into English as The Awakening.[6] She also published a memoir, The Sky Over Wales, in 1997. In the same year, her short-story collection Not Singing Exactly won the Wales Book of the Year award.

Family

In 1958 Siân James married the Welsh Shakespearean actor Emrys James and set up a home with him in London and later Worcestershire. They had four children, William, Owen, Jo and Anna.[7] Emrys James died in 1989.[1]

Works

  • One Afternoon (1975) (Reprinted by Persephone Books in 2023)
  • Yesterday (1978)
  • A Small Country (1979)
  • Another Beginning (1979)
  • Dragons and Roses (1983)
  • A Dangerous Time (1984)
  • Love and War (1994)
  • Storm at Arberth (1994)
  • Not Singing Exactly (collected short stories, 1996)
  • Two Loves (1997)
  • The Sky Over Wales (memoir, 1997)
  • Summer Storm (1998)
  • Second Chance (2000)
  • Outside Paradise (short stories, 2001)
  • Summer Shadows (2004)
  • Return to Hendre Ddu (2009)

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Tony Curtis (9 August 2021). "Siân James obituary". The Guardian. Retrieved 11 August 2021.
  2. ↑ "One Afternoon". Persephone. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
  3. ↑ Meic Stephens, A Book of Wales: an Anthology (J. M. Dent, 1987)
  4. ↑ Tony Curtis, Wales at War: Critical Essays on Literature and Art (Seren, 2007)
  5. ↑ Bafta Cymru
  6. ↑ "The Awakening". Seren. Retrieved 20 May 2018.
  7. ↑ Jones, Catherine (30 November 2001). "A long life in words". Western Mail. Cardiff: Western Mail and Echo Ltd: 13.

Further reading


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