Welsh Journals

ABSTRACT The Welsh poet Goronwy Owen (1723-69) achieved fame during his lifetime, and was not forgotten in Wales even after his emigration to Virginia in 1757. His poems were published in 1763 in a volume entitled Diddanwch Teuluaidd [Familial Delight] which re-appeared in a second edition in 1817. No further collection appeared until John Jones of Llanrwst issued his Gronoviana, also containing fifty of the poet's letters, in 1860. In 1875 the scholar and bibliophile the Revd Robert Jones of Rotherhithe published his prospectus for a new edition of Owen's work in two volumes. Although the imprint on The Poetical Works ofthe Rev. Goronwy Owen shows a publication date of 1876, the volumes appeared in parts from 1875 to 1878 and constituted a de luxe edition which reviewers felt would be beyond the means of most Welsh readers. Jones based his editorial work on the text in Diddanwch Teuluaidd; but one of his copies of that work, preserved in his collection in the Swansea Central Library, has been rebound with interleaving, and his MS notes draw heavily on the comments on Owen's poetry by the Morris brothers of Anglesey, William Morris in particular. Additional textual notes appear to have been provided by Jones himself, with the help of other scholars, including in particular D. Silvan Evans of Aberystwyth and Lewis Edwards of Bala. It was Lewis Edwards who reviewed (anonymously) the first parts of the Poetical Works in YTraethodydd in 1876. Although it was Isaac Foulkes with his popular shilling edition of Goronwy Owen's works, published in 1878, who captured the popular market, Robert Jones's edition was an acknowledgement of Owen's importance. Jones's particular strength as an editor was his ability to compare Owen's work with that of eighteenth-century poets writing in English, though his commentary on linguistic matters is less reliable. The quality of his edition helped to establish Goronwy Owen's almost legendary status as a poet.