0:00:02 > 0:00:04Gwyn Alf Williams experienced history at first-hand,
0:00:04 > 0:00:08from the industrial melting pot of Merthyr, to the beaches of Normandy.
0:00:12 > 0:00:15His passion, his wit and his radical politics
0:00:15 > 0:00:19made him one of the most exciting historians of his time.
0:00:19 > 0:00:21He didn't want simplicities.
0:00:21 > 0:00:24He wanted to understand ourselves as a subtle people,
0:00:24 > 0:00:29a complex people, as he also put it, a naked people, under an acid rain.
0:00:29 > 0:00:35Gwyn's vision of history was as uncompromising as the man himself.
0:00:35 > 0:00:38A very famous English historian said to me about Gwyn, "The problem
0:00:38 > 0:00:43"with Gwyn is, he's got the Muhammad Ali complex - 'I am the greatest.'"
0:00:43 > 0:00:47He knew his stuff, so he would argue until the cows came home.
0:00:47 > 0:00:50The more troubled aspects of his character
0:00:50 > 0:00:51led him to the brink of despair.
0:00:51 > 0:00:56I drank a lot. My marriage broke up. I was in a bad state.
0:00:57 > 0:01:01His salvation would lie in re-inventing himself,
0:01:01 > 0:01:03as a modern historian for the masses.
0:01:03 > 0:01:10# Then, comrades, come rally And the last fight, let us face. #
0:01:10 > 0:01:11Dewch nawr.
0:01:11 > 0:01:14THEY SING IN RUSSIAN
0:01:35 > 0:01:38Gwyn Alfred Williams was born in the Dowlais area
0:01:38 > 0:01:43of Merthyr Tydfil in 1925. Growing up in the industrial heart of Wales
0:01:43 > 0:01:45at a time of great social change,
0:01:45 > 0:01:48was the perfect upbringing for a historian.
0:01:48 > 0:01:51He had a very strong sense of Dowlais.
0:01:51 > 0:01:54"The Samaria of South Wales," he called it.
0:01:54 > 0:01:57He always rooted himself in that background
0:01:57 > 0:02:02and he was extraordinarily proud of that industrial environment,
0:02:02 > 0:02:03but also,
0:02:03 > 0:02:06the interplay between rural and urban,
0:02:06 > 0:02:09between north and south, Welsh speaking, English speaking.
0:02:09 > 0:02:10It was all part
0:02:10 > 0:02:15of that great mix, which Gwyn appreciated so much.
0:02:15 > 0:02:20But despite Dowlais' rich heritage its glory days had long faded.
0:02:20 > 0:02:25It had become dismal Dowlais, at the time when Gwyn was born, in 1925 -
0:02:25 > 0:02:29a byword, really, for deprivation and poverty and unemployment
0:02:29 > 0:02:31and this left its mark on him, there's no doubt about that.
0:02:31 > 0:02:33I remember when I was a kid,
0:02:33 > 0:02:35standing either on South Street
0:02:35 > 0:02:37or Hall Street - I can't remember which now -
0:02:37 > 0:02:40watching them blow up the last of the stacks
0:02:40 > 0:02:41of the old iron works.
0:02:41 > 0:02:45There was a small bang, then a big bang and then the stack settled,
0:02:45 > 0:02:48like a cripple, settling himself into a wheelchair.
0:02:48 > 0:02:51Then it was all over, the dust blew into the cracks in our faces
0:02:51 > 0:02:55and we turned around and walked back into Dowlais. And it was ghastly -
0:02:56 > 0:03:01closed-up shops, crumbling town, beaten people.
0:03:01 > 0:03:04Dowlais dying on its feet, during the Depression.
0:03:04 > 0:03:07Gwyn's family was better off than most in Dowlais.
0:03:07 > 0:03:11His parents were both Welsh-speaking school teachers,
0:03:11 > 0:03:14though Gwyn's own use of Welsh was largely confined to Sunday school.
0:03:14 > 0:03:16Growing up in the 1930s,
0:03:16 > 0:03:19he and the other lads of the Gwernllwyn Chapel gang
0:03:19 > 0:03:23were bewitched by a cult more sinister than non-conformism.
0:03:23 > 0:03:25We were hypnotised by the Hitler Youth.
0:03:25 > 0:03:28We didn't know anything about their ideas,
0:03:28 > 0:03:32but, nevertheless, their gorgeous uniforms, their armbands,
0:03:32 > 0:03:35their rallies, their songs, their marches captivated us.
0:03:37 > 0:03:40So, we ended all our meetings with the Hitler's salute and words like,
0:03:40 > 0:03:45"Iber sturmbannfuhrer" and "Reichsarbeits commando",
0:03:45 > 0:03:48whatever on our lips. The one thing we liked was armbands,
0:03:48 > 0:03:49but otherwise, the Gwernllwyn Chapel gang
0:03:49 > 0:03:53came to operate as extramural branch of the Hitler Youth.
0:03:53 > 0:03:58But Gwyn was about to undergo a radical, political conversion.
0:03:58 > 0:04:01I wanted to see what made my father tick
0:04:01 > 0:04:03and so when they were out at the pictures,
0:04:03 > 0:04:06I went into what we called his middle room and he called his study...
0:04:06 > 0:04:10Masonic gear, Labour Party books, a tyst and there was
0:04:10 > 0:04:13these red and yellow covers of the Left Book Club
0:04:13 > 0:04:14and I took one down and it was on Spain.
0:04:14 > 0:04:18The Spanish Civil War was in its last stages, then.
0:04:18 > 0:04:21Very big with us. Volunteers and everything.
0:04:21 > 0:04:24And I was absolutely bowled over by this
0:04:24 > 0:04:29and so I took the whole gang with me and we read and read and read...
0:04:29 > 0:04:32CANNON BLASTS
0:04:32 > 0:04:35Gwyn and his friends were captivated by the stories of ordinary men,
0:04:35 > 0:04:39who'd left towns like Dowlais, to fight fascism in Spain,
0:04:39 > 0:04:41as members of the International Brigades.
0:04:43 > 0:04:46So we became quite passionate members of the International.
0:04:46 > 0:04:51That's what got us - the idea of an international army of people,
0:04:51 > 0:04:53all aiming at the same end.
0:04:57 > 0:05:00I saw a funeral of a man who'd come back from Spain.
0:05:00 > 0:05:02He had no religion,
0:05:02 > 0:05:06so obviously, they gave him a Church of England funeral.
0:05:06 > 0:05:08There were Dowlais Spaniards there.
0:05:08 > 0:05:11You could tell they were Spaniards. They wore red ties,
0:05:11 > 0:05:15brown boots and wouldn't speak to the curate and they gave him
0:05:15 > 0:05:21a communist funeral, with a red flag and The Internationale.
0:05:21 > 0:05:22I was inspired!
0:05:22 > 0:05:26I rushed down to the office, "Give me a gun, send me to Spain!"
0:05:26 > 0:05:30I remember there was a huge, high counter and a man's head
0:05:30 > 0:05:33came over the top. "Son", he said,
0:05:33 > 0:05:36"Son, come back when we're desperate!"
0:05:38 > 0:05:41The International Brigade might not have had a place for Gwyn,
0:05:41 > 0:05:43but the British Army did.
0:05:43 > 0:05:46Having completed his studies at Cyfarthfa Castle Grammar School,
0:05:46 > 0:05:50he was conscripted at the age of 18.
0:05:50 > 0:05:51During his army training,
0:05:51 > 0:05:55he came across the writings of the Welsh nationalist, Saunders Lewis.
0:05:57 > 0:06:01This is where I first read it, Catterick Camp, Yorkshire.
0:06:01 > 0:06:04I was a soldier in the British Army. I was 18, a passionate
0:06:04 > 0:06:07young communist and a passionate Welsh patriot.
0:06:07 > 0:06:10To me, then, the two were identical.
0:06:10 > 0:06:14One wintry day in 1944,
0:06:14 > 0:06:18I read a poem of Saunders Lewis, Y Dilyw - The Deluge.
0:06:18 > 0:06:23Y Dilyw 1939, was a vitriolic attack on the industrial communities
0:06:23 > 0:06:24of South Wales.
0:06:37 > 0:06:41It drove me into such a fury that I rushed to my commanding officer
0:06:41 > 0:06:47and demanded compassionate leave, so that I could go home and shoot him.
0:06:48 > 0:06:53Gwyn would soon be doing plenty of shooting, but not at Saunders Lewis.
0:06:53 > 0:06:57In June 1944, he became part of the invasion force,
0:06:57 > 0:06:59sailing for Gold Beach in Normandy.
0:06:59 > 0:07:02I must have looked like a Christmas tree -
0:07:02 > 0:07:04great mountain of equipment, with two little feet sticking out
0:07:04 > 0:07:07and the boots were one size too big, anyway.
0:07:07 > 0:07:10So, in the morning, we went up on check
0:07:10 > 0:07:14and queued up for Gold Beach, near Arromanches.
0:07:14 > 0:07:17I remember tossing and turning in that bunk,
0:07:17 > 0:07:21pitching all over the place, full of premonitions.
0:07:31 > 0:07:35Gwyn landed on Gold Beach shortly after D-Day.
0:07:35 > 0:07:38Attached to the 43rd Wessex Division,
0:07:38 > 0:07:40he took on German Tiger tanks...
0:07:42 > 0:07:45..and survived driving over a mine in a jeep.
0:07:45 > 0:07:47He made it to Paris in time for General de Gaulle's
0:07:47 > 0:07:51triumphant return and the celebration of VE Day.
0:07:51 > 0:07:55A friend of mine, called Sion ab Emrys, and I stole -
0:07:55 > 0:07:59borrowed - a Union Jack from the British Embassy
0:07:59 > 0:08:01and started to march up the Champs-Elysees.
0:08:01 > 0:08:03A great crowd formed around us.
0:08:03 > 0:08:06Some of them sang Tipperary -
0:08:06 > 0:08:11FRENCH ACCENT: # He's a long way to Tipperary. # and so on.
0:08:11 > 0:08:14They fell silent when a bus came through,
0:08:14 > 0:08:19carrying back prisoners liberated from Hitler's concentration camps.
0:08:19 > 0:08:22They were still in their striped pyjamas.
0:08:22 > 0:08:26All around them, we sang and shouted and drank Champagne
0:08:26 > 0:08:30and waved flags. They just stared at us.
0:08:30 > 0:08:33They seemed completely bewildered.
0:08:33 > 0:08:35They were grey, they looked alien. They never smiled.
0:08:37 > 0:08:40Having witnessed some of the defining events
0:08:40 > 0:08:43of the 20th century at first-hand, Gwyn returned to Wales.
0:08:43 > 0:08:47There, he married Maria Fernandez, an old friend from Dowlais,
0:08:47 > 0:08:50whose family came from Spain.
0:08:50 > 0:08:52The couple moved to Aberystwyth,
0:08:52 > 0:08:56when Gwyn got a scholarship to study history at the university.
0:08:58 > 0:09:00When War Minister, Emanuel Shinwell, visited the town,
0:09:00 > 0:09:03to recruit students for the army,
0:09:03 > 0:09:06Gwyn joined a demonstration against him.
0:09:06 > 0:09:08We swept into the square,
0:09:08 > 0:09:13led by communists and Welsh republicans,
0:09:13 > 0:09:16with all these banners, and it was chaos,
0:09:16 > 0:09:20because they reached the front line, Shinwell came and began to make
0:09:20 > 0:09:24a stupid speech about, "All of you..." He said,
0:09:24 > 0:09:28"You'll have to see army service, whether you like it or not."
0:09:28 > 0:09:32Well, of course, most of us had seen four years and had come out
0:09:32 > 0:09:36and there was a terrible row and they pushed forward
0:09:36 > 0:09:41and these mothers with handbags were clobbering these students,
0:09:41 > 0:09:44who were disrupting their beloveds.
0:09:44 > 0:09:46Things like that were an absolute bitch.
0:09:46 > 0:09:48I remember a friend of mine carrying a banner, saying,
0:09:48 > 0:09:51"Peace, peace", with which he was clobbering
0:09:51 > 0:09:55the head of another friend, still shouting, "Peace, peace"
0:09:55 > 0:09:57and bashing his brains out.
0:09:57 > 0:10:00And there was a terrible explosion of rage
0:10:00 > 0:10:03and they were all milling round and beating each other up,
0:10:03 > 0:10:05when somebody went up
0:10:05 > 0:10:08the lamp post and began to sing Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau
0:10:08 > 0:10:11and then everybody fell quiet,
0:10:11 > 0:10:13stood to attention, even Shinwell.
0:10:13 > 0:10:16And we all sung Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau.
0:10:16 > 0:10:18And that was the end of it.
0:10:18 > 0:10:21CONGREGATIONAL SINGING OF WELSH NATIONAL ANTHEM
0:10:28 > 0:10:32Gwyn graduated from Aberystwyth with Outstanding First Class Honours
0:10:32 > 0:10:34in 1950. He then completed a masters degree,
0:10:34 > 0:10:37before being appointed as a history lecturer at the university.
0:10:41 > 0:10:45Gwyn was my tutor for Welsh history and I have to say,
0:10:45 > 0:10:48it was a mind-blowing experience.
0:10:48 > 0:10:52First of all, he was a lecturer par excellence.
0:10:52 > 0:10:55He was telling jokes during his lectures,
0:10:55 > 0:10:58I mean, this was in stuffy, puritanical Aberystwyth.
0:10:58 > 0:11:01He'd start lectures by saying something like,
0:11:01 > 0:11:04"It was June on Dowlais top.
0:11:04 > 0:11:06"I know it was June because it was snowing."
0:11:06 > 0:11:11Gwyn took the big picture. He was very keen on understanding
0:11:11 > 0:11:14the relationships between things like geography and history.
0:11:14 > 0:11:18Not as a theoretician, not in a, kind of, scientific way,
0:11:18 > 0:11:20but a, kind of, complete way.
0:11:20 > 0:11:24Culture, politics, economy, society - they were seamless.
0:11:26 > 0:11:28This holistic approach to history
0:11:28 > 0:11:31was appreciated in Britain's youngest university, York.
0:11:31 > 0:11:34When it opened in 1963,
0:11:34 > 0:11:36Gwyn accepted an invitation to teach there.
0:11:36 > 0:11:39One of his first students was Jim Walvin.
0:11:39 > 0:11:42You had this extraordinary creative energy going on,
0:11:42 > 0:11:44because people were re-thinking,
0:11:44 > 0:11:47"How do you teach history?" or "How do you teach English or chemistry?"
0:11:47 > 0:11:50People re-thinking the basics of undergraduate
0:11:50 > 0:11:52education and right in the middle of all this,
0:11:52 > 0:11:55amongst the historians, was Gwyn Alfred Williams,
0:11:55 > 0:11:57this extraordinary, little fella.
0:11:57 > 0:12:01An absolute ball of fire, whizzing around the place,
0:12:01 > 0:12:03firing off ideas, left and right.
0:12:03 > 0:12:06I mean, he was an unmissable person.
0:12:06 > 0:12:08Gwyn's charismatic performances
0:12:08 > 0:12:13were soon attracting students from beyond the history department.
0:12:13 > 0:12:15Wherever he lectured, and it didn't matter what he was lecturing on,
0:12:15 > 0:12:19the only problem was finding a room big enough to house the audience.
0:12:19 > 0:12:22It would be packed.
0:12:22 > 0:12:24Now, there are not many academics who can do that,
0:12:24 > 0:12:28who can actually fill a lecture hall with non-specialist people,
0:12:28 > 0:12:30who just want to listen to what you have to say.
0:12:30 > 0:12:36To hear Gwyn lecture was to be confronted by a great actor.
0:12:36 > 0:12:39What you had was stage presence.
0:12:39 > 0:12:43I mean, the passion of his lectures is something I will never forget.
0:12:43 > 0:12:47They inspired us. He was like a firework on the lecture stage.
0:12:47 > 0:12:50He burned himself up. He was almost Dickensian.
0:12:50 > 0:12:54I mean, he could be screaming and shouting, ranting and raving
0:12:54 > 0:12:59and then go into cold, lucid, forensic finger pointing
0:12:59 > 0:13:01and, "How dare you disagree."
0:13:01 > 0:13:04You know, there would be this madness in him.
0:13:10 > 0:13:11In May, 1968,
0:13:11 > 0:13:14when student protestors took to the barricades in Paris,
0:13:14 > 0:13:17it started a wave of unrest that swept the Western world,
0:13:17 > 0:13:19reverberating even in Yorkshire.
0:13:21 > 0:13:25It was tremendous, you know. I could lecture on anything
0:13:25 > 0:13:31and the French May of '68 happened then and it was a tremendous moment.
0:13:31 > 0:13:35And I wrote a book on it and lectured on it
0:13:35 > 0:13:39and it was all packed with people. Absolutely packed.
0:13:39 > 0:13:42Lecture after lecture, they all packed in.
0:13:42 > 0:13:44I was a particular hero of the anarchists.
0:13:44 > 0:13:51I've got these badges here, turned out by York Anarchist Group.
0:13:51 > 0:13:55Viva Gwyn. We are all Welsh history professors.
0:13:55 > 0:13:59I think ultimately, one of his difficulties was that he...
0:13:59 > 0:14:01he liked to have followers.
0:14:01 > 0:14:05He wanted to be part of this little sect that he belonged to.
0:14:05 > 0:14:07He was very seductive.
0:14:07 > 0:14:09Huge numbers of students wanted to be on his courses
0:14:09 > 0:14:12and, of course, that then itself became an end in itself.
0:14:12 > 0:14:16He wanted to have more students sign on for his courses,
0:14:16 > 0:14:20as a confirmation that, indeed, he was the greatest.
0:14:22 > 0:14:25Gwyn's reputation as a rising star of academic history
0:14:25 > 0:14:28spread beyond York when he published his first book.
0:14:30 > 0:14:31He began as a medieval historian
0:14:31 > 0:14:34and some people still think that his best book was his first,
0:14:34 > 0:14:38Medieval London, which is a wonderful survey of a few centuries
0:14:38 > 0:14:41of medieval London life. And then he
0:14:41 > 0:14:44begins to look at early 19th century radicalism,
0:14:44 > 0:14:48English artisans of 1790s, early trade unions.
0:14:48 > 0:14:51He's looking at the French Revolution, he writes works on that.
0:14:51 > 0:14:56He spreads himself very rapidly to envelop a European history.
0:14:56 > 0:15:00He wrote about the Welsh in America, he wrote about the Merthyr Rising,
0:15:00 > 0:15:03he wrote about Gramsci, the Italian socialist.
0:15:03 > 0:15:06He was not a narrow historian, by any means.
0:15:06 > 0:15:10Gwyn was as passionate on the page as he was in person,
0:15:10 > 0:15:14but his enthusiasm could sometimes run away with him.
0:15:14 > 0:15:18There's a wonderful bit in one of the books he wrote
0:15:18 > 0:15:20about a pub in North Wales where
0:15:20 > 0:15:23they unfurled the tricolour during the French Revolution and says,
0:15:23 > 0:15:25"Liberte, fraternite, egalite!"
0:15:25 > 0:15:30I'm not sure that ever happened in Trawsfynydd or Machynlleth, frankly,
0:15:30 > 0:15:33but it's a great story and I think, in a sense,
0:15:33 > 0:15:34he was a great storyteller.
0:15:34 > 0:15:37Now, whether that makes for great scholarly history
0:15:37 > 0:15:39is another matter altogether.
0:15:39 > 0:15:42What he did do was inspire people to be more imaginative
0:15:42 > 0:15:43about their writing -
0:15:43 > 0:15:46to use language as he did, more creatively.
0:15:46 > 0:15:50Gwyn's work was part of a wider academic movement,
0:15:50 > 0:15:54reclaiming and retelling the neglected history of the masses.
0:15:54 > 0:15:58It inspired a new generation of Welsh historians.
0:15:58 > 0:16:01It was following on from the ways in which American, French
0:16:01 > 0:16:04and English historians, actually, were writing history from below.
0:16:04 > 0:16:06History from below, for Gwyn,
0:16:06 > 0:16:12was bringing the lower orders into public prominence.
0:16:12 > 0:16:14Bringing the Welsh working class, in particular,
0:16:14 > 0:16:17into prominence, for the first time, so he believed.
0:16:17 > 0:16:20And suddenly, a Welsh history, that didn't have, of course,
0:16:20 > 0:16:23kings or queens or diplomacy since the Middle Ages,
0:16:23 > 0:16:26became as central as anything else.
0:16:26 > 0:16:31And Gwyn, I think, rapidly became the acknowledged head of that
0:16:31 > 0:16:36band of historians, because of the power of his insights
0:16:36 > 0:16:40and, straightforwardly, that he was politically committed.
0:16:40 > 0:16:44This was a very, very left wing historian, we were a very,
0:16:44 > 0:16:46very left wing generation.
0:16:46 > 0:16:50So, Gwyn was the one that we, kind of, looked up to,
0:16:50 > 0:16:53that we wanted to be our chieftain.
0:16:53 > 0:16:57With young Welsh historians looking to Gwyn for leadership,
0:16:57 > 0:17:02he was beginning to feel the weight of his exile in Yorkshire.
0:17:02 > 0:17:05Here is a Welshman in a very, very English institution,
0:17:05 > 0:17:09shaped by cultural factors that most of his colleagues had no idea about.
0:17:09 > 0:17:13South Wales, it was a chapel, it was left wing politics -
0:17:13 > 0:17:16all of those things that were alien to almost all of his colleagues.
0:17:16 > 0:17:19He could have been talking about the far side of the Milky Way
0:17:19 > 0:17:21for many of them.
0:17:21 > 0:17:26I think he felt the oppressiveness, really, of middle class England.
0:17:26 > 0:17:29So, a job went in Cardiff, professorship in Cardiff.
0:17:29 > 0:17:32I tried for that and I got it.
0:17:32 > 0:17:34When he first comes back into Wales,
0:17:34 > 0:17:38he wants to come because he does see this intellectual sea change
0:17:38 > 0:17:41that's happening within the teaching and writing of Welsh history
0:17:41 > 0:17:43and he wants to be part of that.
0:17:43 > 0:17:45And I was under the illusion I was coming home
0:17:45 > 0:17:47and I found Cardiff was not home at all,
0:17:47 > 0:17:49particularly not Cardiff history department,
0:17:49 > 0:17:52but that's a personal thing. I won't go into that.
0:17:52 > 0:17:57He reckoned that if he came back to Cardiff in 1974, he'd be welcomed
0:17:57 > 0:18:01with a fanfare of trumpets, but it didn't happen in the department.
0:18:01 > 0:18:05The problem with Cardiff at the time was the-then history department
0:18:05 > 0:18:11was full of people who were extraordinarily slow,
0:18:11 > 0:18:15stolid, orthodox and, in some instances, bitterly resented
0:18:15 > 0:18:19precisely the flamboyance of a Gwyn Alf. They didn't think
0:18:19 > 0:18:22that's what a professor of history should be about.
0:18:22 > 0:18:27Having been feted as a star lecturer at York, Gwyn felt isolated
0:18:27 > 0:18:31and frustrated in Cardiff. He had neither the temperament
0:18:31 > 0:18:33nor the desire to play at academic politics.
0:18:33 > 0:18:40He was not one for slow, ardent committee work, for, you know,
0:18:40 > 0:18:43actually listening to people, tolerating their views.
0:18:43 > 0:18:47I mean, either you understood, b-b-boy, or you d-d-didn't.
0:18:47 > 0:18:50And if you didn't, then you must be stupid.
0:18:50 > 0:18:52And you know, that's the way Gwyn was
0:18:52 > 0:18:56and he was somebody whose enthusiasms could spill over,
0:18:56 > 0:18:59sometimes into brutality against people.
0:18:59 > 0:19:02I mean, there was a sharp edge to his tongue.
0:19:02 > 0:19:07In 1979, Gwyn campaigned fervently for devolution.
0:19:07 > 0:19:11The Welsh people's rejection of it in that year's referendum
0:19:11 > 0:19:13was a blow he took personally.
0:19:13 > 0:19:17I felt the whole of Welsh history had been rendered meaningless
0:19:17 > 0:19:21by that vote. We'd have to re-write the whole thing.
0:19:21 > 0:19:27And in a state of utter despair, I rejoined the Communist Party.
0:19:27 > 0:19:30But Gwyn discovered that the Communist Party
0:19:30 > 0:19:31had changed beyond recognition.
0:19:33 > 0:19:35Meanwhile, his position in Cardiff University
0:19:35 > 0:19:38was becoming increasingly difficult.
0:19:38 > 0:19:42The darker sides of his personality, I think, came to the fore.
0:19:42 > 0:19:44I mean, Gwyn could get depressed
0:19:44 > 0:19:48about lots of things, very, very quickly.
0:19:48 > 0:19:51He'd always been showing the traits of a manic depressive
0:19:51 > 0:19:56but there were many more downs than ups, by the late 1970s
0:19:56 > 0:19:59and the early 1980s, and he reckoned that he was racing
0:19:59 > 0:20:01with the undertaker, by that time.
0:20:02 > 0:20:04Conflicts in Gwyn's professional,
0:20:04 > 0:20:07personal and political lives multiplied,
0:20:07 > 0:20:09until he could no longer deal with them.
0:20:09 > 0:20:15I went to pieces. I drank a lot. My marriage broke up.
0:20:15 > 0:20:17I was in a bad state.
0:20:19 > 0:20:24In 1983, at the age of 58, Gwyn retired from Cardiff University,
0:20:24 > 0:20:26ending his professional career as an academic.
0:20:26 > 0:20:29Still haunted by the devolution referendum,
0:20:29 > 0:20:32he continued to wrestle with the meaning of Welshness.
0:20:32 > 0:20:37So, I went back and I tried to rewrite all of Welsh history
0:20:37 > 0:20:43without any suppositions - socialist or nationalist or any of them.
0:20:43 > 0:20:46I failed, I presume, but I wrote When Was Wales?
0:20:46 > 0:20:50His view of Wales was that it was a constant series of fractures,
0:20:50 > 0:20:53from the Bronze Age through industrialisation, onwards.
0:20:53 > 0:20:57In other words, you don't have the continuity, the notion that we
0:20:57 > 0:21:00have always been Wales, there have always been the Welsh people.
0:21:00 > 0:21:02You know, Gwyn just thought that was rubbish.
0:21:02 > 0:21:05It was rubbish in terms of the languages that were spoken,
0:21:05 > 0:21:07it was rubbish in terms of the people who came in,
0:21:07 > 0:21:10migrations out, migrations, it wasn't history.
0:21:10 > 0:21:13It was ideology, it was mythology.
0:21:13 > 0:21:17So, his view of Wales was that we were always rediscovering Wales,
0:21:17 > 0:21:21re-inventing Welshness and that Wales would always be what
0:21:21 > 0:21:23we wanted it to be.
0:21:23 > 0:21:26So, he embraced Wales, as a landscape,
0:21:26 > 0:21:30as a geographical peninsula, in which some historical people,
0:21:30 > 0:21:33some humanity at various times,
0:21:33 > 0:21:36decided and discovered how it is that they wish to be Welsh.
0:21:36 > 0:21:40The publication of When Was Wales? in 1985 coincided with
0:21:40 > 0:21:43a renewed interest in Welsh history by the mass media.
0:21:47 > 0:21:50That year, an explosive history series burst onto Welsh screens
0:21:50 > 0:21:54that would enthral a generation of viewers.
0:21:54 > 0:21:56Drawing a line between past and present,
0:21:56 > 0:22:00it embraced 2,000 years of struggle, survival and faith.
0:22:00 > 0:22:04The Dragon Has Two Tongues was big budget, big-name television.
0:22:06 > 0:22:10Wynford Vaughan Thomas was, initially, the presenter
0:22:10 > 0:22:14and I, pretty early on, realised that his perception of Welsh history
0:22:14 > 0:22:17and mine were not altogether compatible
0:22:17 > 0:22:21and I'd already felt that we needed another presenter
0:22:21 > 0:22:27and then I saw Gwyn speaking in this wonderful speech. He was a superb
0:22:27 > 0:22:32public speaker, and I thought, "He should be the other voice."
0:22:32 > 0:22:35Wynford Vaughan-Thomas, elder statesman
0:22:35 > 0:22:38of Welsh broadcasting, faced off against Gwyn Alf,
0:22:38 > 0:22:43historian of the people, in a fight for the meaning of Welsh history.
0:22:43 > 0:22:45For Gwyn, this was also a personal struggle to reclaim
0:22:45 > 0:22:46his career as a historian,
0:22:46 > 0:22:50but he would need to shape up for the contest.
0:22:50 > 0:22:52While used to holding court in the lecture hall,
0:22:52 > 0:22:56he had yet to master the brevity of the television soundbite.
0:22:57 > 0:23:01I said, "Action" and Gwyn was off, you know,
0:23:01 > 0:23:08and it was like a lecture delivered with great skill and pace
0:23:08 > 0:23:11and speed, but, you know, I just remember thinking,
0:23:11 > 0:23:14"God, we've got a problem here."
0:23:14 > 0:23:18And actually the camera man took me to one side and said,
0:23:18 > 0:23:21"Do you realise you've got a presenter with a stammer?"
0:23:21 > 0:23:25The stammer, sometimes, worked to his advantage,
0:23:25 > 0:23:29because as he was forcing the words out and he was spitting them out,
0:23:29 > 0:23:31they made such an impact, you know,
0:23:31 > 0:23:35"The rupture of Wales," and you could actually...
0:23:35 > 0:23:40Because he was so into the story and he wanted to get his message across.
0:23:40 > 0:23:44Gwyn used his passionate staccato delivery to full effect,
0:23:44 > 0:23:47when he filmed his piece on the drowning of the village
0:23:47 > 0:23:48of Capel Celyn.
0:23:48 > 0:23:51Every Welsh Labour MP in the House of Commons,
0:23:51 > 0:23:56including those most opposed to Welsh nationalism,
0:23:56 > 0:24:00voted against this project, to no avail.
0:24:00 > 0:24:05There were two kinds of democracy at stake here.
0:24:05 > 0:24:11Within the Parliamentary democracy of the United Kingdom of Great Britain
0:24:11 > 0:24:17and about a half of Northern Ireland, the Welsh, if need be,
0:24:17 > 0:24:20could be drowned by a democratic vote.
0:24:20 > 0:24:25I don't think Wales had come up with a historian who could make pieces
0:24:25 > 0:24:29to camera in such an effective and colourful way as Gwyn did.
0:24:31 > 0:24:35Gwyn was a master of the monologue, but it was his head-to-head debates
0:24:35 > 0:24:38with Wynford Vaughan-Thomas that set the screen alight.
0:24:38 > 0:24:41Instead of saying, like most television history,
0:24:41 > 0:24:44"This is what happened in the past", it was a way of saying,
0:24:44 > 0:24:47"Here is a debate about what happened in the past."
0:24:47 > 0:24:50I do not judge the actions of the people in the past,
0:24:50 > 0:24:54I do not accept any inevitability. There is no such word.
0:24:54 > 0:24:59I am looking at what happened. That was a joke.
0:24:59 > 0:25:02I'm looking at what has happened. Where are the gentry?
0:25:02 > 0:25:05Do you want a kind word for the gentry, I'll give you one - farewell.
0:25:05 > 0:25:09Gwyn actually used to tell him, "You think Welsh history is cosy."
0:25:09 > 0:25:12And Gwyn always used to see history from the viewpoint
0:25:12 > 0:25:16of the ordinary person and, of course, that wasn't cosy, at all.
0:25:16 > 0:25:21The closer we got to the present, the more real the disputes became.
0:25:21 > 0:25:26I would report back what Wynford had said to Gwyn and Gwyn would say,
0:25:26 > 0:25:27"He can't get away with that!
0:25:27 > 0:25:29"I've got to do another piece, in response to it."
0:25:29 > 0:25:34And then I'd tell Wynford what Gwyn said and Wynford would say,
0:25:34 > 0:25:35"What? That's outrageous!"
0:25:35 > 0:25:38I think that Wales is going to come through and for why?
0:25:38 > 0:25:42Because we have this inner secret survival. My theme about continuity.
0:25:42 > 0:25:45You are the optimist and if the Welsh people think like you,
0:25:45 > 0:25:46they will die.
0:25:46 > 0:25:50I am the pessimist. If they think like me, they will live.
0:25:50 > 0:25:52In Aberystwyth, tensions were getting worse and worse
0:25:52 > 0:25:56and Gwyn was in a rage and he actually stormed out
0:25:56 > 0:25:58and he said, "That's it, I'm quitting.
0:25:58 > 0:26:00"I'm not carrying on with the programme.
0:26:00 > 0:26:02"That is it!"
0:26:02 > 0:26:06He called me a Marxist nagbag and I called him a marshmallow historian.
0:26:06 > 0:26:09He said he wasn't going to work any more and I got furious
0:26:09 > 0:26:13and stormed out of the hotel and went round to an old pub
0:26:13 > 0:26:17where I used to go, as a student, and I marched in and I said,
0:26:17 > 0:26:18"Give me a pint!"
0:26:18 > 0:26:21And the barman said, "Excuse me, are you Freddy Starr?"
0:26:21 > 0:26:24So, I blew up again and went back to the devil I knew.
0:26:24 > 0:26:28He loved moving from university to television.
0:26:28 > 0:26:31He was totally fed up with administration, with teaching
0:26:31 > 0:26:33and marking and examining.
0:26:33 > 0:26:36You know, he'd done all that and, you know, he loved admiration.
0:26:36 > 0:26:39He loved to be loved. Nothing pleased Gwyn better.
0:26:39 > 0:26:42It was a huge success and this is when Gwyn
0:26:42 > 0:26:45became a television celebrity and a national celebrity.
0:26:45 > 0:26:48Being involved in that series gave him a new sense
0:26:48 > 0:26:50of purpose and direction.
0:26:53 > 0:26:55Welcome to today's Camelot.
0:26:56 > 0:26:59Over the next decade, Gwyn brought the talents that made him
0:26:59 > 0:27:03a sensational lecturer to a string of history programmes.
0:27:03 > 0:27:07What is Lenin doing 05in a Welsh non-conformist chapel?
0:27:08 > 0:27:10One of these took him to the Ukraine,
0:27:10 > 0:27:13where his experiences in the mining town of Donetsk
0:27:13 > 0:27:17confirmed his disillusionment with Soviet-style communism.
0:27:17 > 0:27:20This place is a tissue of contradictions.
0:27:21 > 0:27:23The pits have spotless clinics
0:27:23 > 0:27:28and the city hospital doesn't even have hypodermic needles.
0:27:29 > 0:27:33It is somehow characteristic that all those roses bloom
0:27:33 > 0:27:38so magnificently because disease-bearing spores
0:27:38 > 0:27:41cannot live in the polluted air.
0:27:45 > 0:27:48Back in Wales, Gwyn was enjoying the fresh air
0:27:48 > 0:27:50and rural tranquillity of Carmarthenshire,
0:27:50 > 0:27:54where he'd made a home for himself, with his new partner, Sian.
0:27:56 > 0:28:01Following a struggle with lung cancer, Gwyn Alfred Williams,
0:28:01 > 0:28:04died on 16 November, 1995, aged 70.
0:28:05 > 0:28:08I miss him now, you know, when I'm reading history, I think,
0:28:08 > 0:28:11"Oh, I wonder what Gwyn would think of this?"
0:28:11 > 0:28:14I still long for those moments when we could discuss and debate
0:28:14 > 0:28:15and argue it all out.
0:28:15 > 0:28:18A man of infuriating contradictions.
0:28:18 > 0:28:21A man that most of us would have followed anywhere
0:28:21 > 0:28:23and I can't think of anyone else I'd say that of.
0:28:23 > 0:28:29He was a complete one off and fantastic that Wales had him
0:28:29 > 0:28:32in the 20th century and that so many of us learned from him
0:28:32 > 0:28:33and, indeed, loved him.
0:28:42 > 0:28:45Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd