Absolute Optimist: Remembering Eluned Phillips

An affectionate yet critical biography of Eluned Phillips, an unsung heroine of Welsh literature. A controversial figure: a passionate woman who ignited passionate responses in others. She was only the second women to have won the National Eisteddfod crown and the only woman ever to have won it twice (1967 and 1983). Phillips was unusual among Welsh writers of her generation in that she embraced a bohemian lifestyle - taking her to prewar London and Paris, where she made the acquaintance of major artists Augustus John, Dylan Thomas, Edith Piaf, Jean Cocteau, Maurice Chevalier and Pablo Picasso.

About the Author :
Menna Elfyn is an award-winning poet and playwright who writes with passion of the Welsh language and identity. She is the best known and most translated of all modern Welsh-language poets. She is the author of over twenty books of poetry, children's novels and educational books, numerous stage, radio and television plays, and she has written libretti for US & UK composers. She is a former Director of the Masters Programme in Creative Writing at UWTSD, Carmarthen and is a Swansea University Literary Fellow.

Review :
Eluned Phillips was born in 1914, the same year as Dylan Thomas. Her career and reputation as a poet, however, could not have been more different. Whereas Thomas became a literary superstar, Eluned Phillipss poetic reputation was challenged and besmirched almost from the beginning, with the result that she all but disappeared from Welsh literary consciousness during her long life (she died in 2009, aged 94). Menna Elfyn sets out to re-examine the poets life and achievement in this impassioned and at times angry biography, first published in 2016 as Optimist Absoliwt Cofiant Eluned Phillips, and ably translated for this English-language edition by Elinor Wyn Reynolds. Eluned Phillips, of course, wrote in Welsh, so her reputation had to be made or broken here in Wales, and broken, to all intents and purposes, it was. She had the distinction of being the only woman during the twentieth century to have won the Crown at the National Eisteddfod twice, for Corlannau (Folds) in 1967, and for Clymau (Ties) in 1983. This was a singular achievement, yet from the beginning there were rumours that she had help with Corlannau and even that it had been written by someone else. These rumours were repeated when Clymau won in Ynys Mn. Menna Elfyn has had access to the poets papers and proves beyond a doubt that these rumours were unfounded and malicious. Why was the literary establishment so against her? Menna Elfyn suggests that it was partly due to Phillipss unconventional nature, both as a woman and as a poet, and perhaps above all that she was a woman who bested men at a time when Welsh-language poetry was very much a male preserve. Eluned Phillipss upbringing was unusual. She grew up in Cenarth, Carmarthenshire, in a household of women (mother, grandmother, various cousins) and never knew who her father was. This gave her a sense of independence and self-reliance. Leaving school, she went to London, earning a living of sorts writing romantic stories for magazines, but moving also on the fringes of Londons Bohemia, especially the group surrounding Augustus John. Then she moved to Paris where she became friends with Edith Piaf and was introduced to the writers, artists and musicians who made Paris a centre of creativity in the 1930s. She also became involved with a Breton nationalist, known only as Per, and helped a number of Bretons flee imprisonment or execution in France at the end of the War. This was a far cry from rural Cenarth, but Eluned Phillips never forgot her community there and always returned to it. No doubt a further reason for the Welsh literary establishments suspicion and resentment was that she published little. There was only one collection of poems during her lifetime, Cerddi Glyn-y-ml (Glyn-y-ml Poems), published late in life, and she only appeared in magazines if asked for a contribution. How could someone seemingly come from nowhere and snatch the Crown twice from the grasp of established male poets? She was also a friend of the controversial Dewi Emrys and wrote a biography of him. In the tight-laced Welsh-speaking world of the time, this alone made her suspect. She was even rumoured to have been his mistress. Late in life Eluned Phillips found a different kind of success as a librettist and song writer, working with composer Michael J. Lewis, with the South Wales Male Voice Choir, and above all with the Welsh Choir of South California, visiting southern California and the Welsh community there every year in her later years. Absolute Optimist is a very readable and impassioned account of an extraordinary woman and writer. Eluned Phillips left behind a wealth of poetry and fiction in manuscript. It is to be hoped that this will now be published so that her true achievement can finally be assessed. John Barnie It is possible to use this review for promotional purposes, but the following acknowledgment should be included: A review from www.gwales.com, with the permission of the Welsh Books Council. Gellir defnyddio'r adolygiad hwn at bwrpas hybu, ond gofynnir i chi gynnwys y gydnabyddiaeth ganlynol: Adolygiad oddi ar www.gwales.com, trwy ganiatd Cyngor Llyfrau Cymru.