This has been voted the greatest novel written in Welsh. It was published in 1961 and translated into English in 1995. The setting is the North Wales village of Bethesda, which was a community built around a slate quarry. The narrative voice is that of a young boy at various ages (well, it’s slightly more complicated than that …) and it happens around the time of the First World War, just before, during and just after. The author Caradog Prichard was born in 1904 and spent his childhood in Bethesda, so there is certainly an element of autobiography. One particular similarity is what happens to the child’s mother in the novel. As with Prichard’s own mother, she has mental health issues and ends up in the local asylum. The descriptions are vivid and harrowing. Prichard’s mother spent almost forty years in an asylum. He was a journalist, moving to London. He wrote some poetry and this novel. I liked both of the stories and it was compelling to read about the different struggles the two main characters were forced to endure due to their wartime situation. There is a mystery subplot about her husband's past that makes Maddie question how well she even knew him. Sometimes Maddie stumbled on clues or someone would accidentally say something they shouldn't have, it happened at a snail's pace and, from the halfway point onwards, the plot dragged. In June 2023 a dramatisation by Rhiannon Boyle was broadcast on BBC Radio 4, and a Welsh version broadcast on BBC Radio Cymru later in the month. [1] Poetry and other works [ edit ]

A Welsh language version of this drama was broadcast on Radio Cymru in two parts on June 11th and June 18th 2023 at 4pm.Menna Baines, author of Yng Ngolau'r Lleuad - Ffaith a Dychymyg yng Ngwaith Caradog Prichard, a biography of the author. I didn’t take to this book initially but slowly its humour and energy won me over. I loved the narrator who has a zest for life that’s hard to quench and a love for his gran and his widowed mother that is matched only by his love of bread and butter and lobscouse (a kind of lamb and vegetable stew). He even prays for food, inspired by a line from the Lord’s Prayer he’d recited in church that morning: For many, many others, however, it's a mind-blowing, life-changing, world-shaking experience akin to being allowed for several hours to stare into the face of God. It will change your life. I loved the fact that Maddie continued to work as a children’s illustrator after she married and had children, modern beyond her time and with a supportive husband who did not want to prevent her from her art. When she left London, to move to her husband Philip’s family home, it felt poignant given the news reports we’ve had in recent weeks of mothers and children fleeing from their homes with what they were able to salvage, Maddie and her daughters leaving with the few items salvaged from the rubble where their house had stood.

Maddie and her two young daughters; Sarah and Grace have to leave London when their home is destroyed in a bombing raid. Maddie’s husband Philip is missing, last seen with his squadron somewhere in Northern France. I couldn’t quite give it a five as I felt that Maddie was more emotionally involved than Philip in their marriage and though there was a love story , it wasn’t at its truest form with the betrayal and lies . There are moments of genuine beauty in the writing, almost a touch of magical realism, and the occasional flourish of such lyrical fluidity that it feels close to being stream-of-consciousness when, in reality, it is anything but. And never has Christianity or the bible seemed more beautiful than in the hands of Prichard. The book must be even more wonderful in the original Welsh. Over this and the following three chapters, we follow the boy as he wanders the dim streets of his home town, sometimes with his best friend Huw, recalling the events of his life with a poetic tenderness. He comes across characters like Grace Ellen Shoe Shop, Frank Bee Hive, Little Will Policeman, Will Starch Collar, Price the School and a multitude of people named after their occupation, idiosyncrasy or some other befitting moniker. Common practice, even today, in parts of Wales. The boy, I guess about 10 years old, has several graphic encounters, from dying to death to mental illness, that are told without prejudice or judgement, and because of that, all the more unsettling. Roaming silently amidst sadistic teachers, priests, policemen and illness, the boy is observant, but aware of his inability to alter what is going on around him. He expresses himself only in that he will not work in the slate quarry.Meanwhile, the reader also learns about what happens to Philip in France; the slaughter of most of his colleagues, his evasion of capture and the multiple brave French people who risk all to protect an Englishman. In addition to Un Nos Ola Leuad, he also wrote a number of short stories, Y Genod yn Ein Bywyd (1964), and a striking semi-fictional autobiography, Afal Drwg Adda (1973). He had made his mark as a poet at an early age and was crowned Bard of the National Eisteddfod three years running between 1927 and 1929. [4] He also won the chair at the Llanelli National Eisteddfod in 1962 for his poem Llef un yn Llefain. [5] At their best his poems are as powerful and disturbing as Un Nos Ola Leuad. His published collections of verse are: Initially she feels very unwelcome and begins to feel she may have made a mistake, however as time progresses she begins to form bonds with them and they all start to settle. When the family home in London is bombed in the early 1940s, Maddie and her two young daughters take refuge in Norfolk, in the country house where Maddie’s husband Philip spent the summers of his childhood. But Philip is gone, believed to have been killed in action in northern France. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Maddie refuses to give up hope that she and Philip will some day be reunited. The narrator of 'One Moonlit Night' is a boy who is around ten years old. He lives in a small village with his mother, who raises him on her own. Most people in the village are poor. The story happens at around the time of the First World War. Our unnamed narrator describes his life in the village, the adventures he has with his best friends Huw and Moi, the poverty that people experience everyday, how people are still happy and show kindness to each other inspite of being poor, the role of the church in village life, how the war impacts the life of the people and the tragedy and occasional glory it brings, how a child's life can suddenly change and be turned upside down because of things that grownups do – these and other things are explored in the book. Our ten year old narrator's voice is beautiful and charming and his friendship with his besties Huw and Moi is beautifully depicted. The narrator even falls in love with a girl who is older than him and it is beautiful and sad at the same time. I love the way the narrator's voice takes us into the mind of a ten year old boy and makes us see the world through his eyes. It is brilliant. Caradog Prichard manages to capture that time so beautifully and there are many scenes which made me smile with pleasure and there are also some scenes that made me cry.

She felt overwhelmed and lonely, but this is just too much, too soon, too forced. I didn't buy it for one second. She is married with two children, Philip is recently pronounced missing not dead, and there is no indication that she hates her husband or has lost feelings for him. On the contrary, she thinks about him non-stop. And Lyle is bland as toast, they have no chemistry together. Maddie had more of it with Gussie but of course, the only single male character is hovering close by so she had to hook up with him. The added hint of a ghost story , the mystery of flora and the kidnapping of her younger daughter Grace kept you entertained throughout the book. Prichard was also a wonderful writer but, unlike Thomas whose heart lies interred in the earth and whose soul is in Heaven (hopefully), Prichard's entire being, his entire life-force, his heart, his soul, his mind, his everything are contained - alive and vibrant - within the narrative of this book. Knyghton becomes a lifeline for Maddie and the girls but there is something unusual that Maddie feels when she enters certain rooms and when she is working on her illustrations something seems to take over her. She finds herself drawing a picture of a young girl she has never met. Here there was a slight supernatural element that entered the book as well as Maddie seeing thing’s and usually I would find this laughable and so unrealistic but here it works so well and fitted in perfectly with the overall tone and mood of the book. It worked well and only added a heightened sense of unrest and of Maddie needing to find out just what went on at the house which has led to Lyle being so aloof and argumentative and Gussie becoming a person almost cut off from the real world and retreating into a small cocoon with just her and her beloved dogs. It was as if the heart of Knygthon had been lost and was filled with empty ghosts. Set in a North Wales slate-mining village at the time of the first world war, the story appears to be simple - it's about a boy and how that boy's life falls apart. But the dreamlike vision of disintegration that Prichard weaves is layered and complex, as we realise that the child, apart from observing the peculiar adult goings-on in the village, is witnessing his mother lose her mind.

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This book is beautifully written with wonderful characters you soon care about and an involving storyline. There’s enough going on to keep you interested, but not too much that you become confused. I especially liked Maddie and could relate to her trying to bring up her children by herself, while working as an illustrator. I also loved the setting of Knyghton and the farmland around it, the nature and countryside. I also enjoyed the novel being set in WWII and following what happened to Philip too. Plot [ edit ] Penrhyn Quarry, near Bethesda, circa 1900 - Prichard was born in Bethesda in 1904. It was an almost entirely Welsh-speaking village and owed its existence to the slate quarrying industry. In 1905, when Prichard was 5 months old his father was killed in a quarry accident. One Moonlit Night by Caradog Prichard was originally published as Un Nos Ola Leuad in 1961. English translation by Philip Mitchell published in 1995 by Canongate. Crying without caring who was looking at me. Crying as though it was the end of the world. Crying and screaming the place down, not caring who was listening. And glad to be crying, the same way some people are glad when they’re singing, and others are glad when they’re laughing. Dew, I’d never cried like that before, and I’ve never cried like that since, either. I’d love to be able to cry like that again, just once more. I honestly don’t read enough historical fiction. I’m not entirely sure why and I can’t off hand remember the last one I read. One Moonlit Night was my first Rachel Hore read I believe even though I do own at least one more of her books, but it won’t be the last. I have a taste for historical fiction now and I’m itching for more.