The Ladies of Gregynog

Eirene White

• Publisher: University of Wales Press
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781783161164
• Edition: 3
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Historical Biographies
• Index: History

This is the story of Gwendoline and Margaret Davies, whose grandfather was a millionaire railway contractor and bridge builder, and who inherited half a million pounds each.

The Gregynog Press

IN the wider world, the fame of Gregynog rests largely on the products of the Gregynog Press, many of whose printed books have become international collectors’ pieces of startling value. Yet, in part, the emphasis on the Press was fortuitous. The original concept was that Gregynog should be a home and a point of inspiration for a number of crafts, not printing and book-binding alone. Robert Ashwin Maynard, the first Controller of the Press, was trained as an architect and worked for a while under Paul Waterhouse before he turned to painting. His colleague, Horace Walter Bray, was a stage designer. Both acknowledged the influence of Spencer Gore, Harold Gilman and Walter Sickert and both had shown works with the London Group at the Goupil Gallery in 1914.

When Maynard was appointed early in 1921, introduced by Hugh Blaker, the sisters’ picture buying adviser, he was sent off to London for eighteen months, to the Central School of Arts and Crafts, to study pottery. Furniture making, weaving and silversmithing were also mentioned. It turned out that Maynard did not care much for pottery, but was enthralled by printing and by the possibility of using wood-block illustrations, in which he later excelled. He had found his metier.

So the Press started out, after a pause when it seemed possible that the sisters might buy the Shakespeare Head Press at Stratford-upon-Avon. This fell through and the Gregynog Press stood on its own feet. The work of the Press has been described in detail by Dorothy Harrop, both in A History of the Gregynog Press (London: Private Libraries Association, 1980) and in a chapter in Gregynog (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1977). From a more personal standpoint, my father gave a talk to the Double Crown Club (The Gregynog Press – a Paper read to the Double Crown Club, Oxford University Press, 1954). I would venture to refer interested readers to these publications. My own comments are confined to the way in which the Press fell into place in the Gregynog scheme of things, how far it achieved what its founders set out to do and where, in my view, it might perhaps have set course rather differently.

It was not until December 1925 that the Press was able to issue a prospectus offering to the public its first three books, the earliest of which had been published in 1923 and 1924 respectively. They were Poems of George Herbert selected by Sir Walford Davies; Poems by Henry Vaughan edited by Ernest Rhys and Caneuon Ceiriog edited by Professor J. Lloyd Jones. To help to draw public attention to them TJ wrote a piece in the Western Mail setting out how he saw the Press, of which he was Chairman from its inception in 1921 to its demise early in the Second World War. It is worth quoting from the closing paragraphs of TJ’s article:

The feature which marks out the Gregynog experiment from others is that it attempts all the arts that go to the production of a complete book; it casts its own type and prints, it designs and cuts the initial letters, it designs and cuts all decorations and woodcuts, it makes marbled papers, designs and executes the bindings. The result is a unity and harmony in the final product, which is seen at its best so far in the superb ‘Ceiriog’. This book is being sold at a ridiculous price (one guinea) compared with its cost, in the hope that it may reach the schools and colleges of Wales and prove an inspiration to budding Welsh craftsmen … Every letter on the page has its fascinating story of turns and twists, of Gothic extravagance in this age and Roman austerity in that. The setting of the verses on the page, the size of the initials, the weight of the woodcuts, these and a hundred other problems have exercised the minds of the craftsmen in their pursuit of perfection … They have sought after excellence and have made no compromise with meanness.*

For a press which was intended to include ‘chiefly authors related to Wales who have written in English or Welsh’ it is surprising how many books were ultimately produced which bore no relation to Wales at all. Of the forty-two books published, eight were in the Welsh language, one being the translation into Welsh by Sir John Morris-Jones of Omar Khayyam. The others in original Welsh were Caneuon Ceiriog; Caniadau – T. Gwynn Jones; Llyfr y Pregethwr; Psalmau Dafydd; Caniadau – W. J. Gruydd; Clych Atgof – O. M. Edwards; Gweledigaethau y Bardd Cwsc – Ellis Wynne with an English version by T. Gwynn Jones, the only bilingual volume published, bringing special printing problems of ‘matching’ the two texts.

Books related to Wales encompassed George Herbert (Poems); Henry Vaughan (Poems and his translation of The Praise and Happinesse of the Countrie-Life); Edward Thomas (Essays and Poems); Richard Davies (An Account of that Ancient Servant of the Lord); Lord Herbert of Chirbury (Autobiography); W. H. Davies (Selected Poems and The Lovers’ Song-Book); Thomas Love Peacock (The Misfortunes of Elphin); John Sampson (XXI Welsh Gypsy Folktales) and the Life of St. David, generally regarded as one of the most attractive of the Press publications.

Both groups were good of their kind and up to 1929 the Press pursued a consistent course. From 1930 to 1940 when the Press closed, only W. J. Gruydd’s Caniadau, O. M. Edwards’s Clych Atgof, and Y Bardd Cwsc appeared in Welsh, with W. H. Davies’s Lovers’ Song-Book and the Welsh Gypsy Folk-tales in English. One might fairly add the Revelation of St. John the Divine and the Lamentations of Jeremiah, published in 1933 and 1934 respectively, as of general interest to both English and Welsh readers.

But looking back on the decade of the thirties, one cannot help asking just why all the effort and expense which went into the near-perfect printing of the Gregynog books should have been lavished on some of the titles which appeared. Certain ones are self-explanatory. George Bernard Shaw and Lascelles Abercrombie became regular guests at Gregynog, the latter being frequently consulted on Press matters. Hence Shaw Gives Himself Away, 1939 and Lyrics and Unfinished Poems by Lascelles Abercrombie, 1940. TJ had a longstanding friendship with Salvador de Madariaga, Professor of Spanish Studies at Oxford and later Spanish Ambassador to Paris and Washington. This accounts for Don Quixote, 1934 but it does not justify the printing of two less than exciting Spanish classics, The Star of Seville, 1935, and The Lovers of Teruel, 1938, translated by Henry Thomas. Nor is it easy to understand the selection of Fulke Greville’s Caelica or of several other titles.

The illustrations to the Fables of Esope, 1932, by Agnes Miller Parker are superb; the wood engravings by Blair Hughes-Stanton to illustrate Milton’s Comus, 1931, The Revelation of St. John the Divine, 1933 and The Lamentations of Jeremiah, 1934, are of a quality which could hardly be surpassed, while the later products of Maynard and Bray included the charming Essays of Elia, 1931, and the impressive two-volume edition of Plays of Euripides, 1931, again chosen partly out of friendship with the translator, Gilbert Murray.

There were, of course, other outstanding successes. The History of St. Louis, 1937, translated by Dr Joan Evans and produced under the direction of James Wardrop was a most handsome volume. And whatever one’s judgement of the texts chosen, the outstanding skill of the binder, George Fisher, in his special levant editions of many of the books, brought to the Press a renown of its own. For the ordinary editions, it was notable that local girls worked in the bindery to a very high standard, indicating what imaginative enterprise might achieve in rur...