"This is the first comprehensive anthology of writing about war in the twentieth century from Wales. While few of us now living have had direct experience of war, in uniform or as civilians, it is likely that the wars our families fought or suffered in, and more recently the fear of nuclear war or terrorism, will have been a significant factor in our lives. War has shaped Wales more than any other force through the last century. The two world wars challenged, broke and shaped political borders, traditions, societies, indiciduals and their beliefs more profoundly than the wars of previous centuries. Through their fiction, poetry and journals, as well as by their direct action in battle and in protesxts against war, Welsh men and women have made some of the most memorable responses to those challenges. All the major writers of Wales are represented, from Edward Thomas, who died on the Western Fron int 1917, to prize-winning contemporary novelist, Sarah Waters. This anthology also includes Dylan Thomas, Wilfred Owen, Wyn Griffiths, Kate Roberts, David Jones, Sian James, Dannie Abse, Alun Lewis, R.S. Thomas, Robert Graves, Gillian Glarke, Leslie Thomas, Raymond Williams and many others..." -- from back cover


Tony Curtis was born in Carmarthen in west Wales in 1946. He studied at Swansea University and Goddard College, Vermont, and is the author of several collections of poetry, including War Voices (1995); The Arches (1998) and Heaven's Gate (2001). He has also written books of criticism, including How Poets Work (1996) and Welsh Painters Talking (1997), The Art of Seamus Heaney (1982) and Dannie Abse (1985). He is the editor of several books, including The Poetry of Pembrokeshire (1989); The Poetry of Snowdonia (1989); and Coal: an anthology of mining (1997). In 2007, he edited the anthology, After the First Death, and published his latest collection of poetry, Crossing Over. Tony Curtis is Professor of Poetry at the University of Glamorgan where he directs the M. Phil Writing course. In 2001 he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and was awarded a D. Litt in 2004. He has toured extensively giving poetry readings and lectures and won the 1993 Dylan Thomas Award and a Cholmondeley Award in 1997. He lives in Barry, Wales.
-- Contemporary Writers, British Council