Anrhydedd Cymry'r Cyfanfyd - The World-Wide Welsh Award

ANRHYDEDD CYMRY’R CYFANFYD

THE WORLD-WIDE WELSH AWARD

2007 WORLD-WIDE WELSH AWARD FOR JAN MORRIS

The international committee of Anrhydedd Cymry’r Cyfanfyd – The World-wide Welsh Award has announced that this year's award will go to author Jan Morris ‘for her exceptional and outstanding contribution to Welsh culture, heritage and letters.’ Dr Arturo Roberts, publisher of Ninnau, the North-American Welsh newspaper and international coordinator of the committee said "When we decide on the recipient of the award, we take into account the contribution that individual has made to Welsh culture and the Welsh way of life. Jan Morris was nominated by an overwhelming majority of those asked to provide possible candidates, and we consider her to be the most deserving.”

Henry Jones-Davies, former editor of Cambria magazine and the Welsh co-ordinator of the Award committee, said “Not only is she one of the greatest living European writers, but Jan Morris’s commitment to Wales and Cymreictod has inspired and delighted an entire generation. She is nothing less than a national treasure, and it is highly appropriate that we should honour her with the only national award Wales has.”

The award was established at the 2000 National Eisteddfod in Llanelli, where it was presented to former Plaid Cymru President and first Member of Parliament Gwynfor Evans in an emotional ceremony attended by a capacity audience. The following year it was presented collectively to the people of Y Wladfa, the Welsh Patagonian community.

An avowed republican and patriot, Jan Morris is the author of over 30 books -including a novel, Our First Leader, translated into Welsh by her son, the poet Twm Morys - a number of travel books on Venice, Oxford, Hong Kong, Trieste and Manhattan, historical works such as the Pax Britannica trilogy which chronicles the rise and fall of the British Empire, and the unashamedly proud and passionately patriotic The Matter of Wales.

Jan Morris has said that her proudest achievement was to be elected to the Gorsedd of Bards.

This year’s ceremony will have added poignancy since the actual award, the ‘Lleuadydd’, a commemorative golden Welsh lunula mounted on a base of Welsh oak, was made by Celtic craftsman and jeweller Anthony Lewis who died in 2005. The first award, also created by Anthony Lewis, remained at Gwynfor Evans’s bedside until his death in 2005.

Anrhydedd Cymry’r Cyfanfyd – The World-wide Welsh Award will be presented at a special ceremony in the pavilion on 7^th August at 1pm by the Archdruid of the Gorsedd of Bards and attended by members of the Eisteddfod Court and other dignitaries.

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