Waugh on the Welsh

"The Welsh character is an interesting study," said Dr. Fagan. "I have often considered writing a little monograph on the subject, but I was afraid it might make me unpopular in the village. The ignorant speak of them as Celts, which is of course wholly erroneous. They are of pure Iberian stock-- the aboriginal inhabitants of Europe who survive only in Portugal and the Basque district. Celts readily intermarry with their neighbours and absorb them. From the earliest times the Welsh have been looked upon as an unclean people. It is thus that they have preserved their racial integrity. Their sons and daughters rarely mate with human-kind except their own blood relations. In Wales there was no need for legislation to prevent the conquering people intermarrying with the conquered. In Ireland that was necessary, for there intermarriage was a political matter. In Wales it was moral. I hope, by the way, you have no Welsh blood?"

"None whatever," said Paul.

"I was sure you had not, but one cannot be too careful. I once spoke of this subject to the sixth form and learned later that one of them had a Welsh grandmother. I am afraid it hurt his feelings terribly, poor little chap. She came from Pembrokeshire, too, which is of course quite a different matter. I often think," he continued, "that we can trace almost all the disasters of English history to the influence of Wales. Think of Edward of Carnarvon, the first Prince of Wales, a perverse life, Pennyfeather, and an unseemly death, then the Tudors and the dissolution of the Church, then Lloyd George, the temperance movement, Nonconformity and lust stalking hand in hand through the country, wasting and ravaging. But perhaps you think I exaggerate? I have a certain rhetorical tendency, I admit."

"No, no," said Paul.

"The Welsh," said the Doctor, "are the only nation in the world that has produced no graphic or plastic art, no architecture, no drama. They just sing," he said with disgust, "sing and blow down wind instruments of plated silver...."

        --Dr. Fagan, a schoolmaster in Decline and Fall (1928), by Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966)

Comments

A Welshman and an Englishman disputed
Which of their lands maintained the greatest state;
The Englishman the Welshman quite confuted
Yet would the Welshman naught his brags abate.
"Ten cooks," quoth he, "In Wales one wedding sees."
"True," quoth the other, "each man toasts his cheese.
--Henry Parrot, c1613

All that I heard him say of it was, that instead of bleak and
barren mountains, there were green and fertile ones; and that one of
the castles in Wales would contain all the castles that he had seen in Scotland.
--James Boswell, quoting Dr. Johnson, in _Life of Johnson_

Each section of the British Isles has its own way of laughing, except Wales which doesn't.
--Stephen Leacock, 1935

There are still parts of Wales where the only concession to gaity is a striped shroud.
--Gwyn Thomas, _Punch_ 18 June 1958

I can still remember Dylan Thomas, drunk as a lord, yelling scornfully in the streets of Soho: "Land of my fathers! They can
bloody well keep it!"
--James Kirkup, c1953

They value themselves much upon their antiquity: The antient race of their houses, and families, and the like; and above all, upon their antient heroes: their King Caractacus Owen ap Tudor, Prince
Lewellin, and the like noblemen and princes of British extraction; and as they believe their country to be the pleasantest and most agreeable in the world, so you cannot oblige them more, than to make them think you believe so too.
--Daniel Defoe, _A Tour through the Whole Island of Great Britain_, 1724-7.

FLUELLEN: Your majesty says very true: if your majesties is remembered of it, the Welshmen did good service in a garden where leeks did grow, wearing leeks in their Monmouth caps; which, your majesty know, to this hour is an honourable badge of the service; and I do believe your majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek
upon Saint Tavy's day.
KING HENRY V: I wear it for a memorable honour;
For I am Welsh, you know, good countryman.
--Shakespeare, Henry V

Hooray for English culture
To Wales it's such a blessing
Tuneless songs and tasteless jokes
And blowsy bags undressing.
--Harri Webb, 1969

Rene Cutforth said that the Welsh were Mediterraneans in the rain.
--Nancy Banks-Smith, in _The Guardian_, 17 October 1979

The way to make a Welch-man thirst for blisse
And say his prayers on his knees:
Is to perswade him, that most certaine 'tis,
The Moone is made of nothing but greene Cheese.
And hee'l desire of God no greater boone,
But place in heaven to feed upon the Moone.
--John Taylor, _All the Works of John Taylor_, 1630

Sais Sais y gach yn ei bais,
Y Cymro glan y gach allan.
(The Saxon shites in his breech,
The cleanly Briton in the hedge.)
--Old Welsh proverb

[Sedulia]

Those are great quotes! Thanks very much. Diolch yn fawr iawn!

[Waffham]

This is very funny, unless you think it's serious. Anyway who does think it's serious should remember it's being said by a character, not by Waugh himself, who looked (and drank) remarkably like Dylan Thomas and whose name, as pointed out elsewhere on the blog, is the singular of "Welsh".

[Sedulia]

As an American I can say with absolute sincerity that I am not prejudiced against the Welsh. However I admit I love prejudiced rants of this kind -- it's so funny what people manage to be prejudiced against.

I'm a fan of Evelyn Waugh although he himself tended to rant a bit on other subjects.

[Alexander Hay-Whitton]

The quotation from Waugh has been a bit Bowdlerised.

[Sedulia]

Really? What's the real one? I copied it directly from the book—is there another one?