Construction Of The Welsh National Identity In R.S.Thomas’s Poetry(1945-1990)

Ronald Stuart Thomas(1913-2000)is one of the greatest Welsh English poets in the twentieth century.His parents were both Welsh,but Thomas grew up under English education.He was deeply troubled by his identity,wanting to seek back his Welsh national one.Thomas had a strong Welsh national consciousness,so there are lots of Welsh elements in his poetry.Facing the falling of Welsh nation,he actively devoted himself into the national movement and his influence on Wales can’t be ignored.This thesis will be divided into five parts.It will do some research on the construction of Welsh national identity reflected in R.S.Thomas’ s poetry during 1945-1990.The first part is an introduction.First it will give us some knowledge of Welsh nation,it’s history and its current state.Then the beginning part will introduce the poet R.S.Thomas,and his identity anxiety.Finally it will introduce literature review of R.S.Thomas’ s poetry and the significance of this thesis.Through the introductory part,it can be seen that the Welsh nation was under a perilous condition.The crisis of the nation and Thomas’ s own identity trouble pushed him to construct Welsh national identity in his poetry.The second part will illustrate how Thomas constructed geographical space in his poetry.“Nature”,“countryside” and “religion”,these are three special sites for Welsh people.Through the description,Thomas presented readers a unique geographical Welsh imagery.The third part will give an analysis on the construction of Welsh personage imagery.Through the characterization of Welsh farmers,new Welsh and Welsh warriors,Thomas reshaped Welsh personage imagery in his poetry,which gave us a comparison between the traditional Welsh imagery and the alienated new Welsh people and,highlighted the beauty of Welsh traditional human nature.The fourth part will focus on cultural imagery.A concrete analysis on Welsh language,Welsh history,and at the same time,the influence of other culture will be made.The last part is a conclusion.Through the Welsh geographical imagery,Welsh personage imagery and Welsh cultural imagery,readers can sense strong national consciousness in Thomas’ s poetry and find a different Wales.Thomas transformed his Welsh memory into Welsh nation,hoping to wake up the soul of Welsh nation and speaking for Welsh through his poetry.By doing this,R.S.Thomas also constructed a consoling place for himself.