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Books: Dylan Thomas: The Pubs

Gwyn Griffiths is taken by the wealth of engaging information in this dossier of Dylan Thomas's favourite watering holes

Dylan Thomas: The Pubs

by Jeff Towns

(Y Lolfa, £12.95)

Pubs were Dylan Thomas's natural habitat. They provided companionship, inspiration and beer, of which he was particularly fond.

That's why fans of his semi-autobiographical short stories or the posthumously published radio talks, Quite Early One Morning, will delight in his volume.

The wealth of information and research is astounding in this riot of pub bohemianism, beginning in Swansea and ending tragically in New York. Thomas drank a lot but, like his writing, it was in the main disciplined and controlled until he went to the US where he came to a tragic early end.

Jeff Towns's comprehensive view of Thomas pubs connects them to his writing, in particular his short stories and it also puts the individual pub in the context of literary and social history, with the section on Swansea hostelries recalling a time when the town was the second busiest port in Britain. The tales about them are so unbelievable we can only assume that they must be true.

It is a book awash with colourful characters and the Fitzroy Tavern's long association with the London artistic crowd is prominently featured.

Less well-known is Thomas's collaboration with Keidrych Rhys and his influential magazine Wales.

His friendship with a host of Swansea artists is well documented, including Fred Janes, Ceri Richards, broadcaster Wynford Vaughan Thomas, composer Daniel Jones, poet Vernon Watkins and the - sometimes - restraining Gwen Watkins, who contributes a foreword to the book.

There are profligate descriptions of larger-than-life characters such as his friend Phil Richards, landlord of The Cross in Laugharne. It was with him that one day Thomas saw a pig on the road and insisted on buying it, naming it Wallace. On another occasion he went to a local market and brought home a couple of live geese.

Such nostalgic and amusing anecdotes give the book all the warmth of a cosy pub and it's written, I would suggest, in a style which Thomas would have approved of. The occasional disjointed thoughts and unexpected connections are all a feature of his own work.

The book is enriched by Wyn Thomas's splendid images of the many pubs with an update of what they are like today. Some appear to have cashed in on the Dylan Thomas legend, but with taste and consideration.

Thomas's final home in Laugharne has a shedload of literary connections, before and after he added to its fame. Coleridge, Richard Hughes, Margaret Atwood and even former US president Jimmy Carter visited the place. This book will surely increase its popularity, likewise Carmarthen and New Quay in Cardiganshire.

All are places to visit with Thomas's short stories and Under Milk Wood to hand - and a fevered imagination.

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