Friday 15 July sees the Library celebrate the centenary of the laying of its foundation stone. The centre point of the day will be the Library’s ambitious bid to cwtsh the building. If you’re on twitter, follow the #cwtsh100 hash-tag.
Creating the cwtsh will be a wonderful positive way to express our respect for the Library’s works and collections. But there will be another highlight on that day for me and I’m sure all the Library staff and supporters. It will be the presence of Prof Dafydd Jenkins – the Library’s oldest reader who is 100 years old, the same age as the building itself!
The longevity of the Dafydd Jenkins is in itself a cause for celebration and wonder. Like the stones of the National Library itself, his life has witnesses the big events of the last ten decades – from wars to devolution.
Dafydd Jenkins, for me, is that valuable and golden threat of a person – a literate, passionate Welshman. His academic career is impressive, he’s an Emeritus Professor. His research and propagation of the Laws of Hywel Dda – Wales’s own laws up until we were incorporated into England in 1536 – has been immense.
But what caught my eye about his long career were two things. Firstly his part in the campaign to get official status and use for Welsh in the law courts – revoking the colonial injustice towards the Welsh language in her own country and secondly his founding and co-editorialship of the periodical, Heddiw (‘Today’).
Starting in 1936, when he was ‘only’ 25 years old with another Welsh literary giant, Aneirin Talfan Davies, Heddiw has all the hallmarks of young patriots anxious for a thought-provoking journal in Welsh. Its articles include pieces on Welsh and European politics and cultural affairs. The list of contributors now reads like a who’s who of Welsh 20th century literary and political life. Letters and poems by Iorwerth Peate who founded the Museum of Welsh Life, Syr Ifan ab Owen Edwards, T. Gwynn Jones, Ambrose Bebb, Kate Roberts and many, many more.
The young Dafydd Jenkins knew them, discussed with them and no doubt, as the copy deadline approached, harrangued them all for articles too. It will be an honour and a privilege for the National Library building to celebrate its centenary the same year as a man who gave such service to Wales and to search of knowledge as Dafydd Jenkins.