Culture, Welsh Language and Sport Committee

Policy Review - English Medium Writing In Wales

Impart Books

Dear Sir/MadamVery many thanks for your kind invitation to submit contributions regarding Policy Review : English medium writing in Wales. I sincerely regret that I am unable to reply in terms of the four areas defined in your letter. However, the committee might be interested to learn about my experience. Although I was born in Yorkshire and I am English-speaking, I can assure you that my first loyalty is now to Wales.My first effort in producing books for Wales was a Welsh language book of bible-based puzzles. Unfortunately, the member of staff on whom I relied did not tell me that ch, dd, ff, II, ng, rh, th, (have I missed any? ) are treated as single letters. Consequently, almost all the print of that book had to be sent for pulping.Many years later, I produced "CROESEIRIAU DARLUNIAU CYMRAEG - WELSH PICTURE CROSSWORDS" and "CHWILOTEIRIAU LLUN CYMRAEG a SAESNEG - WELSH & ENGLISH PICTURE WORDSEARCHES" obviously with the assistance of a very competent Welsh speaker. These books were intended to help Welsh speakers to learn English and English speakers to learn Welsh. Both books could be photocopied or otherwise reproduced by a school which held ONE copy without the payment of any fees whatsoever. I also hoped that the two books might be used by adults learning Welsh. In these computer days, it is fairly easy to produce crosswords or wordsearches in English. It is quite difficult to do so in Welsh with ch, dd, ff, II, ng, rh, th.When ordering the first print, I hoped that every school in Wales would purchase one copy and so ordered 1500 copies. The RRP was fixed as low as possible at £4.95 Things have changed considerably since I was teaching, but then such puzzles would have been extremely useful for the last day of term and when an absent teacher was replaced by a teacher of a different academic subject. I also hoped that the two books might be used by adults learning Welsh, perhaps in senior citizen clubs. These puzzles well and truly emphasise the use of ch, dd, ff, II, ng, rh, th. I enclose specimen copy of each of these books.I am very grateful to the WELSH BOOKS COUNCIL for their help in the sale of these books, but the total sales have been well below expectation. At present, IMPART BOOKS are well out of pocket on the project.Alongside cooperating in the production of picture wordbooks : English only, English with phonetics, English - Bangla, English - Chinese, English - Kiswahili, English - Romanian, English - Russian, English - Arabic - French - German
( details given in www.books.mid-wales.net ), I hoped to produce an English - Welsh Picture Wordbook. However, this project was abandoned due partly to the limited response to the two Welsh books mentioned above and partly due to the fact that there is North Welsh ( North Wales Welsh ), South Welsh ( South Wales Welsh ) and even sometimes Mid Welsh ( Mid Wales Welsh). It would make it much easier for English speakers to learn Welsh if there were just National WELSH.I don't imagine that anything can be done about it, but mutation does not make it easier for English speakers to learn Welsh.I also published "THE KEY TO WALES" by B. TREVOR ROGERSI look forward to hearing from you.Yours sincerelyALICK HARTLEY