Nathan Munday answers the Artist Q&A
Nathan Monday's debut novel, Whaling, is an experimental take on the story of the Nantucket Whalers who founded Milford Haven. Here he takes the Wales Arts Review Artists Q&A.
In the latest of a new series of Q&A’s with some of Wales’s leading artists, musicians, performers, and writers, Nathan Munday talks about his debut novel, and the influences on his work of faith, literature, and Wales.
Where are you from and how does it influence your work?
I’m extremely Welsh – you’ll hear that when you meet me. Having moved around quite a bit, it’s impossible for me to locate my milltir sgwâr. To pinpoint one place with my finger would soon evolve into an exercise involving every digit.
When it comes to writing, ni allaf ddianc rhag hon! Wales is such a layered space. My Dutch wife, Jenna, was drawn to its textured landscape especially when contrasted with the flat, treeless vista of her homeland. No hills there, just dunes, and a very threatening seaside. I’m forbidden to live by the sea because cantre gwaelod is still fresh in her subliminal memory.
Married life began in Tŷ Mawr Wybrnant, the remote birthplace of the Welsh Bible translator William Morgan (c.1545-1604). No central heating, lots of sheep, and floodwater in the second week. For me, that little bangor, that library in the wilderness, captured Cymru. The hearth was illuminated every morning, and I’d welcome people to our shores. I’d tell them of how a shepherd boy mastered nine languages and how the drovers called-in for many a noson lawen. Translating the Scriptures undoubtedly saved the langua
ge, but it also meant that Christ could now speak Welsh.
I’ll never forget that special place.
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