Welsh Journals

of detail is far wider, enabling a coherent and thorough narrative to take place. Very good use is made of investigations by historical geographers into language zones and census returns in relating the positive features of the language during the age of industrialism and evangelicalism. Equally, a good fist is made of explaining the erosion of the language. The Blue Books 'treachery' of 1847 is naturally alluded to but in an undramatic fashion and a very good point is established about the ethos of Darwinianism and utilitarianism being hostile to the perpetuation of the vernacular from the mid-nineteenth century. To the mind of this reviewer, however, this had been an issue in Welsh literary and intellectual circles as early as the 1820s, if not before, being hotly debated, for example, between Gomer and Brutus. The author achieves a marvel of compression in outlining the peaks and troughs of the language in the twentieth century. The links between language and nationalism are underplayed at the expense of delineating the wide variety of cultural movements and innovations. The intrusion of the British state into language maintenance through funding as well as local government initiatives after 1974 are well brought out in a largely sympathetic but not overtly partisan way. The middling status of the language in comparison with other minority European languages is put into good perspective. At a time of considerable flux in government policy over public expenditure, administrative reform and language legislation, one trusts that the author's concluding optimistic remarks hold good. It will also be interesting to see what the University of Wales's current project into the social history of the Welsh language will turn up, not only in terms of supplementing the factual and descriptive information found in the book but also in interpreting the language's course in relation to concepts such as hegemony, political discourse, post-structuralism and gender. W. P. GRIFFITH Bangor COF CENEDL: YSGRIFAU AR HANES CYMRU, VOL. VIII. Edited by Geraint H. Jenkins. Gomer Press, Llandysul, 1993. Pp. xiii, 196. £ 5.95. Detholiad o ysgrifau amrywiol yw cynnyrch y gyfrol hon, yn trafod agweddau gwahanol ar hanes Cymru, a'r tro hwn rhoddir sylw i genedlaetholdeb yng Nghymru'r Oesoedd Canol, John Penri a'i ymgyrch dros ddiwygio crefyddol ar ddiwedd yr unfed ganrif ar bymtheg, cyfansoddiad ac aelodau'r seiadau Methodistaidd yn y ddeunawfed ganrif, y traddodiad cerddorol yn Oes Victoria ynghyd a dau gyfraniad ar y gymdeithas Gymreig yn ail hanner y ganrif ddiwethaf a dechrau'r ganrif bresennol mewn dau faes glo caled tra twahanol i'w gilydd, sef de-orllewin Cymru a Scranton, Pennsylvannia. Arlwy hynod ddiddorol ac mae'n galondid gweld detholiad o ysgolheigion profiadol a rhai ieuainc a chyfraniadau pwysig ganddynt i'w cynnig mewn gwahanol feysydd. Ceir cyfraniad llawer ehangach na'r gweddill gan yr Athro J. E. Caerwyn Williams wrth iddo rychwantu'r Oesoedd Canol a chanfod ynddynt enghreifftiau o