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'William Thomas', bardic name 'Islwyn' (April 3 1832 – November 20 1878), was a Welsh language poet, born near Ynys-ddu in the old county of Monmouthshire, south-east Wales.
Both Islwyn's brothers were engineers, and he was intended for the same profession, but showed an aptitude for the ministry, and was sent to an academy run by Dr Evan Davies at Swansea. He was at one time tutored by a namesake, the poet William Thomas (Gwilym Marles). He became engaged to a local girl, Ann Bowen. Her death in 1853, at the age of twenty, became a source of poetic inspiration to him, and he was a regular winner of local eisteddfod prizes from the 1850s onwards. His two best-known poems are both entitled "Yr Ystorm" ("The Storm"). He began preaching in 1854, and was ordained a Calvinistic Methodist minister in 1859 but never took charge of a church. In 1864 he married Martha, Ann Bowen's step-sister. He edited several periodicals, and the Welsh column of the ''Cardiff Times''.

Contents

Works

Bibliography

Sources

Works

★ ''Barddoniaeth'' (1854)

★ ''Caniadau'' (1867)

★ ''Ymweliad y Doethion a Bethlehem'' (1871)

Bibliography

★ Owen M. Edwards (ed.), ''Gwaith Barddonol Islwyn'' (Wrecsam, 1897)

★ J.T. Jones (ed.), ''Detholiad o waith Islwyn'' (1932)

★ T.H. Parry-Williams, ''Islwyn'' (1948)

★ Meurig Walters (ed.), ''Y Storm'' (1980)

★ Meurig Walters, ''Islwyn: Man of the Mountain'' (1983)

Sources

★ Welsh Biography Online