Rhys Ifans, speaking Welsh and being an outsider in your homeland
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| 09:48 UK time, Tuesday, 11 December 2007
Local boy turned Hollywood actor and proud Welshman Rhys Ifans makes some interesting comments in the Observer Magazine and on which your thoughts would be welcome:
'We lived near the border with England, where the choice was stark. You could either succumb to the encroachment or dig your heels in and resist. I dug my heels in, but I always had my eye on the horizon. There was a definite tension, a sense of being pulled in two directions and a sense of being an outsider. Speaking Welsh and all that. Even as a young boy I felt it, but it has served me in my work. I've drawn on it and used it, in a way.'
That really made sit up and think; As the Saes [Englishman] I thought it was people like me who'd feel like the outsider which I did before starting to dysgu Cymraeg [learn Welsh].
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Rhys has summed up the dichotomy of being a Welsh speaker in the North East.The 'pull' of the Anglicised world is extremely strong, and the sub-concious 'inferiority complex' imposed on us by such a strong English immigrant population really grips you. Think of all the sheep jokes and the anti Cambrian views of people like Clarkson, Gill, Robinson etc. It ever was thus! Gwynedd and the North West doesn't have that problem to such a degree. In the middle ages, the North East was known as Y Berfeddwlad - the middle lands, and that inferiority complex has remained ever since. Well done Rhys for utilising that; turning it on it's head, and capitalising on it. Would be interesting to know how Rhys gets on with Clarkson! Da iawn ti.
Interesting that at a time when Welsh speakers like Rhys are feeling less Welsh, there's a debate going on about Britishness. Isn't that the problem as one dilutes the other? Find out more from political blogger Glyn Davies: http://glyndaviesam.blogspot.com/2007/12/britishness.html
I don't think Rhys was saying he felt less Welsh - but rather that being on the border helped define his Welshness (and made it such a central part of his impish character).
Growing up on the border as a Welsh speaker is more difficult than in the heartlands but it creates a different, perhaps more dynamic, cultural response. The Welsh punk fanzine Llmych came from this area - it could never have come from Gwynedd.
Rhys Ifans and Sean Connery are just the latest in a long line of people who love their homeland so much they go abroad. when you start to describe people different to you as an encroachment, it won't be long before you're describing them as a disease and calling for a cure. I don't know who suffers this inferiority complex as all the welsh speakers i have met are rooted in and proud of their heritage and culture. they don't seem to be suffering any complexes at all, let alone showing any symptoms. Perhaps Rhys ought to stick to speaking lines that others have written for him.